BHOPAL: Going against the party’s official line, another leader of the opposition BJP in Madhya Pradesh has opposed the Citizenship (Amendment) Act.
Ajit Borasi, who unsuccessfully contested from Ghatiya assembly seat of Ujjain district in the 2018 assembly polls, posted on his Facebook page on Tuesday, “NRC and CAA won’t affect the Muslims only, but also the SCs, STs and OBCs. Read it once and you will understand. I’m not a sheep that I’ll move in herd behind what is wrong.”
Importantly, just a few days back, the same BJP leader had reportedly backed the CAA by saying that as far as he understood the new law, it wasn’t against any Indian citizen.
When contacted by the New Indian Express on Wednesday evening, Borasi confirmed to have made the Facebook post opposing the CAA-NRC. But when questioned about having backed the CAA a few days earlier, he said, “After reading the law in-depth, I changed my viewpoint. When I meet you personally, I’ll tell you about the change of mind.”
While the state BJP remained silent over the development, informed sources within the saffron party confided that the anti-CAA post on social media could well be linked to Borasi’s possible future plans of returning to the Congress fold for fighting the assembly by-poll to Agar seat of Agar-Malwa district.
By-election to Agar assembly seat in Agar-Malwa district has been necessitated by the January 30 death of sitting BJP MLA and ex-MP minister Manohar Untwal.
Importantly, just a few days before the 2018 assembly polls in MP, Borasi along with ex-Lok Sabha member father Premchand Guddu had quit the Congress to join the BJP. Subsequently, Borasi was fielded as BJP candidate from Ghatiya assembly seat of Ujjain district, but lost by over 4500 votes to Congress’s Ramlal Malviya.
In the 2013 Vidhan Sabha elections also, Borasi had lost to BJP’s Jitendra Gahlot, while contesting as Congress candidate from Alot seat of Ratlam district.
Borasi’s post on Facebook against the CAA-NRC means he’s the second BJP leader in Madhya Pradesh to have opposed the new law. Just a few days earlier, the BJP MLA from Maihar seat of Satna district Narayan Tripathi had publically opposed the CAA.
Importantly, Tripathi, who had won the Maihar seat on BJP seat in 2016 by-election and 2018 assembly polls, had been a Congress and SP MLA from the same seat in the past.