Cong’s Pankaj Sanghvi, ex-MLA Antar Singh Darbar join Madhya Pradesh BJP

Bhopal:  The Congress got another jolt in Madhya Pradesh (MP) as senior leader,Pankaj Sanghviand former MLA of the grand old party, Antar Singh Darbar joined the BJP on Friday, ahead of the forthcoming Lok Sabha elections.

Senior leader Pankaj Sanghvi had contested two Lok Sabha elections on a Congress ticket from Indore, but of late he was feeling neglected by the state party President, Jitu Patwari.

The other leader, Antar Singh Darbar, a senior politician from MP's economic capital Indore, had resigned from the Congress after being denied a ticket for the Assembly election held in November last year.

He had also filed his nomination from Mhow as an independent candidate at that time. Despite intervention by the Congress leadership led by veterans like Kamal Nath and Digvijaya Singh, the MLA had not withdrawn his nomination.

Antar Singh Darbar had won two Assembly elections from the Mhow seat in 1998 and 2003, but lost to BJP stalwart Kailash Vijayvargiya in 2008 and 2013.

The two leaders joined the BJP in the presence of Chief Minister, Mohan Yadav, BJP state President, VD Sharma and senior party leader Narottam Mishra, who is the head of the joining committee.