Ex-Union minister Rajen Gohain, 17 others resign from BJP

Dibrugarh (Assam), Oct 9 (PTI) Former Union minister and four-time BJP MP Rajen Gohain from Assam’s Nagaon parliamentary constituency resigned from the party along with 17 other members on Thursday, officials said.

In a letter to state BJP president Dilip Saikia, Gohain said he was resigning from the primary membership of the party and stepping down from all party positions with immediate effect.

Seventeen other BJP members, mostly from Upper and Central Assam, also submitted their resignations to Saikia, sources said.

Speaking to PTI, Gohain said he resigned as the party had failed "to fulfil the promises made to the people of Assam and betrayed the indigenous communities by allowing outsiders to settle in the state." He also charged the party's state leadership with "encouraging communal politics and dividing the centuries-old Assamese society".

He represented the Nagaon parliamentary constituency for four terms from 1999 to 2019 and had served as the Union minister of state for railways from 2016 to 2019.

Gohain submitted his letter at the party headquarters in Guwahati. The state president along with senior office bearers are at Dibrugarh to attend BJP's central committee and office bearers meeting during the day.

Saikia, who is also in Dibrugarh, however, did not say whether the resignation has been accepted or not.

Gohain, 74, said that he was disillusioned with the party as it had betrayed its core assurances to the indigenous communities.

"The current BJP leadership in the state allowed outsiders to settle at the expense of the indigenous Assamese people's land and resources," he claimed.

He criticised the government's approach to the contentious issue of illegal immigration, a central plank of the BJP's earlier campaigns.

"The government, which promised that after May 16, 2014, there would not be a single Bangladeshi in Assam, is continuously bringing in Bangladeshis through new tactics," he alleged.

He further said that not granting Scheduled Tribe (ST) status to six indigenous communities of the state was a major point of contention.

The former minister alleged that a key reason for quitting the party was that the present leadership had sidelined its dedicated grassroots workers and did not give due respect to the dedicated workers who sacrificed their youth to advance the party, even after the government was formed in the state in 2016.

He accused the state government of promoting "nepotism" and implementing policies that crush local enterprise by imposing new rules regularly that squeeze the livelihoods of local small businessmen and handing over those opportunities to large outsider business groups.

Assembly elections are due in the state next year. PTI COR DG MNB DG NN