Here’s why five-time MLA Habibur Rahaman quits BJP party

JAIPUR: In a setback for the Bharatiya Janata Party ahead of the Rajasthan Assembly elections, a sitting Member of Legislative Assembly (MLA) of Bharatiya Janata Party miffed over ticket allocation has left the saffron party.

Habibur Rahaman Ashrafi Lamba, who represents Nagaur constituency in Rajasthan state assembly, parted ways with the BJP after Mohan Ram Chaudhary was announced as the party candidate from Nagaur.

Lamba gave his resignation to Rajasthan cabinet minister Prabhu Lal Saini on Monday. “I resigned from the BJP yesterday. Now this must be the policy of the party to not give tickets to Muslim candidates…What can we say about it? I didn’t do anything wrong to not get a ticket… I will decide my further course of action after a meeting with workers today,” Rahaman was quoted as saying by The Indian Express on Tuesday.

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Lamba, who switched allegiance to the saffron party from the grand old party before the 2008 Assembly election once again joined Congress in the presence of former Rajasthan CM Ashok Gehlot and Sachin Pilot in the national capital on Wednesday.

The BJP on Sunday had released the first list of 131 candidates for the upcoming assembly polls in Rajasthan. Yoonus Khan, another Muslim candidate known to be a close associate of CM Vasundhara Raje has also not find his name on the list.

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The names were announced by Union Minister and party leader JP Nadda after a meeting of the BJP central election committee.

The BJP has fielded 25 new faces and 85 sitting MLAs for the assembly polls.

The assembly polls in the state are slated to take place on December 7 in a single phase for all 200 seats. The counting of votes will take place on December 11.

In last assembly polls, the BJP had won 163 of the 200 assembly seats in the state.

Agency inputs