Ranchi: Ruling out his return to the BJP, rebel leader Babulal Marandi today said he has chosen to tread a ‘new path’.
He indicated that ‘doors were open’ to all irrespective of their party affiliations in his campaign against alleged corruption in the Jharkhand government.
Marandi, the former national vice-president of the BJP and the first Chief Minister of the state, left for Delhi to personally hand over his letter of resignation from the Lok Sabha to Speaker Somnath Chatterjee.
Marandi said he did not ‘see any reason’ to meet BJP President Rajnath Singh and formally hand over his resignation letter from the primary membership of the party.
"It is not necessary as I had despatched my resignation letter through the party's general secretary Sanjay Joshi," he said.
"So how can I leave Stephen Marandi? I cannot think of sinking Stephen Marandi midway," he said.
Stephen Marandi is an independent MLA and a former vice-president of Shibu Soren's JMM.
The two Marandis have floated 'Jharkhand Vikas Morcha', a non-political outfit to take on the Arjun Munda government.
Asked whether that meant Yashwant Sinha's 'peace mission' to woo him back to the fold was a lost case, Marandi said "it should not be put that way."
But BJP Rajya Sabha member Ajay Maroo, said he would appeal to the party leadership not to accept his resignation and continue efforts to retain him as the party 'needed' him.
Maroo said it had appeared in the meeting that Marandi was in no mood to stay on in the party. "But I will request the leadership to carry on the mission (to woo back Marandi) till it has achieved success".
Sinha and Maroo separately left for New Delhi today to place before Atal Behari Vajpayee and BJP President Rajnath Singh the details of their meeting with Marandi.
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