Kishore Upadhyay quits Congress to join BJP. Declared BJP nominee from Tehri. BJP’s sitting MLA Dhan Singh Negi joins Congress

The former Congress chief, industrial advisor to the former CM Uttarakhand and two term lawmaker from Tehri Garhwal assembly constituency Kishore Upadhyay has formally joined the Bhartiya Janata Party and got the saffron party ticket as well as a gift from BJP. Having been removed from all the political posts of Congress by the Uttarakhand Congress incharge Devendra Singh Yadav accusing him for anti party activities n hobnobbing with BJP and other party leaders, Kishore Upadhyay have joined BJP after waiting till the last hoping to get the Congress ticket from Tehri assembly seat. But after all the tickets were distributed accept his seat kept on hold till yesterday evening, the saturation point of Kishore Upadhyay’s tolerance crossed all limits, compelling him to join the BJP, the party n ideology he was vertically against since 1983 when he joined the staff of the then Congress general secretary former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi, later on shifted in the staff of the then prime minister Rajiv Gandhi’s close friend and then defence minister Arun Singh. Two term lawmaker from Tehri, having lost the Sahaspur seat in 2017 Kishore Upadhyay and Harish Rawat were on very bitter terms having accused Rawat of ditching him when he made his protege and former Lok Sabha MP Pradeep Tamta, the Rajya Sabha MP from Uttarakhand despite allegedly giving him a commitment. He also blamed him for shifting him from his traditional seat to Sahaspur resulting in his defeat in 2017. Recently, he had met the BJP senior leader and incharge of Uttarakhand BJP Prahalad Joshi and organising secretary Ajay clandestinely, the news of which was leaked in media. His rival group started accusing him for hobnobbing with BJP leaders and weakening the party, the charges denied by Kishore vehemently saying that he had met them in connection with the Vanadhikar Andolan issues of which he was a founding leader. He was also charged on acount of his meeting with the Samajwadi Party president n former CM UP Akhilesh Yadav during these days. There were speculations in the media about Kishore joining BJP but he denied these news terming them as just rumours and baseless accusations by his rival camp within Congress. Being associated with Gandhi family for the last three decades, Kishore Upadhyay plunged in Uttarakhand politics after being active in separate Uttarakhand movement with Harish Rawat, elected lawmaker from Tehri Garhwal twice, holding a state ministerial rank as advisor to then CM Narain Dutt Tiwari. Meanwhile, the present lawmaker of BJP from Tehri Garhwal Dr. Dhan Singh Negi has joined Congress after Kishore Upadhyay was declared as BJP’s official nominee deducting the sitting MLA Negi’s ticket. The BJP has also not declared the ticket from Doiwala, from where its sitting lawmaker for CM Trivendra Singh Rawat has expressed his desire not to contest in order to extensively campaign for his party. Sounds ironical and hypocritical, that on the one hand the Congress leaders take drastic action against Kishore Upadhyay accusing him of hobnobbing with BJP and on the other hand themselves welcome the BJP leaders in their party with open arms.