'Corrupt' Dhumal triggers rebellion

Himachal ex-minister Shastri, 3 others, quit BJP accusing chief minister of putting up state for sale

Lashing out at BJP leader P K Dhumal for being a “corrupt” chief minister, a section of the ruling party’s leaders in Himachal Pra-desh have chosen to quit the party and launch a new political outfit.

An anti-graft front of rebel leaders led by former BJP minister and Speaker Radha Raman Shastri and three other senior leaders of the party said they were “fed up with the widespread corruption”, and have decided to leave the BJP.

“We have resigned from the party. We will soon float a political outfit .Our fight against corruption will continue,” Shastri told reporters here. Accusing the party’s top state leadership of indulging in illegal property transactions, Shastri said the setting up of private universities had become a “roaring real estate business run by the BJP leaders” at the helm. “Dhumal is a conspirator. He has made every attempt to destabilise and destroy the democratic set-up of the party,” he added.

 

Shastri was accompanied by disgruntled BJP leaders, including former Kullu MP Maheshwar Singh (who was recently dropped from the party’s national executive), besides by Mohinder Sofat and Shayma Sharma. “The entire state is up for sale,” Singh said. The rebels said they failed to convince the party’s national president, Nitin Gadkari, and other national leaders of the “rampant corruption” in the state — and had thus decided to leave the BJP.

“Instead of addressing our complaints and cleaning up the party, Gadkari has chosen to sleep over these serious charges,” Shastri claimed. “He hasn’t bothered to get back to us two months after we complained.”