Jharkhand: Former Chief Minister Champai Soren joins BJP

Jharkhand’s former Chief Minister Champai Soren on Friday joined the Bharatiya Janata Party ahead of the Assembly elections later this year.

Soren had quit the state’s ruling Jharkhand Mukti Morcha on Wednesday.

On Tuesday, he announced that he was joining the BJP, claiming that only the Hindutva party was serious about the problem of “infiltrators from Bangladesh”.

While the BJP has persistently made claims about undocumented Muslim immigrants grabbing land in Jharkhand, a Scroll investigation found no evidence for the claim.

Soren joined the BJP in the presence of Union minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma and BJP’s Jharkhand unit chief Babulal Marandi.

“I was embarrassed, and that's why I had decided to retire [from politics],” Soren said after joining the BJP. “However, because of the love and support of the people of Jharkhand, I decided not to retire.”

He added: “I thought that I would launch a new party or join another party, but I will never stay in that organisation where I was embarrassed. Later, I decided to join a party [BJP] to continue serving the people of Jharkhand.”

On August 18, Soren denied reports that he was joining the BJP. The same day, the 67-year-old had said that he felt insulted by the manner in which the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha asked him to step down as the chief minister in July, after 152 days in office, to make way for party leader Hemant Soren to return to the post.

Champai Soren had taken over as Jharkhand’s chief minister on February 2. This came after Hemant Soren resigned from the post on January 31, hours before his arrest by the Enforcement Directorate in a money-laundering case.

After the Jharkhand High Court granted Hemant Soren bail on June 28, Champai Soren from Jharkhand’s Seraikella resigned as the chief minister on July 3.

Earlier on Friday, Ghatshila MLA Ramdas Soren was inducted into the state Cabinet to replace Champai Soren.