Maharashtra: 28 sitting Malegaon corporators join NCP

NASHIK: The Maharashtra unit of Congress suffered a setback as 28 sitting party corporators of Malegaon Municipal Corporation, including mayor Tahira Shaikh, joined NCP in presence of deputy chief minister Ajit Pawar, at Mumbai on Thursday.
The Congress-Shiv Sena alliance is in power in the civic body in the textile town. The mayor's husband and senior Congress corporator Shaikh Rashid too joined NCP.
The mayor said that the Congress corporators were 'disillusioned' with the state Congress leadership for doing nothing to strengthen the party in Malegaon town, which has been a bastion of the Congress for over three decades."We have been requesting the state party leadership to ensure that Malegaon civic body gets adequate funds for developments. But even this issue was ignored by the Congress leadership," said the mayor.
Shaikh Rashid, who had tendered resignation as the Malegaon town Congress president three months back, said that even after his resignation no one from the party bothered to find out why he resigned from that post. "We will strengthen the NCP in the textile town before the local civic polls due in May this year, '' added Rashid.