Four Meghalaya MLAs, including one from the Congress, will join the Bharatiya Janata Party on Tuesday.
The four legislators – former health minister and Congress leader AL Hek, Nationalist Congress Party’s Sanbor Shullai, and two Independents, Justine Dkhar and Robinus Syngkon – will officially join the saffron party at a rally in Shillong on Tuesday evening. They will join the BJP in the presence of Union Minister KJ Alphons and the BJP’s North East chief Ram Madhav.
“I will put in my resignation [from the Congress], before joining the BJP in the afternoon [on Tuesday], along with my friends,” Hek told PTI on Monday. “It will be a homecoming”.
Hek had left the BJP for the Congress in 2009 and was the state’s health minister till 2017.
On December 30, 2017, eight MLAs including five Congress legislators – Sniawbhalang Dhar, Comingone Ymbon, Prestone Tynsong, Rowell Lyngdoh and Ngaitlang Dhar – had resigned from the Meghalaya Assembly. They are expected to join the National People’s Party, an ally of the BJP.
In response, Congress President Rahul Gandhi sacked former Meghalaya Chief Minister DD Lapang as state party president and replaced him with Cabinet minister Celestine Lyngdoh.
The Meghalaya Assembly elections will be held in February. The Congress is the ruling party in the state.
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