Blaming Fadnavis, senior Maha BJP leader Khadse quits to join NCP (2nd Ld)

By QUAID NAJMI Mumbai, Oct 21 : In a big jolt ahead for the BJP ahead of the Bihar elections, its senior Maharashtra leader Eknath Khadse on Wednesday quit the party, holding former Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis responsible for his decision.
Set to join the ruling Maha Vikas Aghadi partner Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) on Friday, Khadse said that he was repeatedly targeted by Fadnavis on trumped-up graft charges which have still not been proved.
This has come as a major embarrassment for the BJP as Fadnavis is the party’s in-charge for the upcoming Bihar polls, voting for which starts from October 28.
Making it clear that he nursed no grouse against the BJP’s Central leadership, Khadse said that “except state President Chandrakant Patil, no BJP leader has called me up so far”.
“My family and I have been humiliated for four years… I worked hard to build up the party in the state for 40 years and this is what I had to undergo.. I am going alone,” Khadse told media persons after resigning as a primary member of the BJP.
Ejected as a minister in June 2016 after graft charges surfaced against him, Khadse – the de facto No 2 in the cabinet headed by Fadnavis – faced further agony after BJP denied a ticket in the 2019 Assembly elections, and he remained a political pariah.