Rebel BJP MP Shatrughan Sinha to contest from Patna Sahib Lok Sabha seat on Congress ticket: Sources

Rebel BJP leader Shatrughan Sinha is likely to contest the upcoming Lok Sabha elections from Patna Sahib constituency in Bihar on a Congress ticket, sources said on Tuesday. This development came in the light of the decision taken by the BJP party's senior leadership during the Central Election Committee meeting to drop Sinha from Patna Sahib Parliamentary constituency from where he is a sitting MP currently. 

The meeting that took place few days earlier, was attended by BJP chief Amit Shah and Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The meeting was also attended by other senior leaders, Bihar’s Deputy Chief Minister Sushil Modi and party’s Bihar unit chief Nityanand Rai.

Shatrughan Sinha has been critical of the party’s top leadership on several occasions in the past. Ever since the 2015 Bihar Assembly elections in the state of Bihar, BJP's sitting MP from Patna Sahib, Shatrughan Sinha adopted a contentious policy towards the ruling party, while criticising it on multiple instances. 

Amid speculations of his exit from the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), he made the stinging attack on PM Modi on his official Twitter handle on Monday, March 11.Sinha hoped that Modi, whom he did not name in his tweets, would bridge the gap between his "kathani" (words) and "karni" (action), "wherever" he was after the Lok Sabha election results.

Furthermore, in January 2019, rebel BJP leader Shatrughan Sinha attended the mega ‘United India’, 'anti-BJP' rally organised by TMC chief Mamata Banerjee in Kolkata along with other leaders of the Opposition party.

Last year, he was stripped of his VIP status at the Patna airport as well, which entailed exemption from frisking and vehicular access to the tarmac, in a development which many saw as being linked to his having fallen out with the BJP.

READ: "Contest 2019 Polls Either On Congress Or RJD Ticket": Bihar Deputy CM Sushil Modi Dares BJP MP Shatrughan Sinha

(With agency inputs)