Veteran Gujarat Congress MLA resigns, likely to join BJP

Senior Gujarat Congress MLA and prominent Koli community leader Kunwarji Bawalia on Tuesday resigned as a legislator as well as from the party, and is likely to get a berth in the Vijay Rupani government.

Bavalia has been a Lok Sabha Member of Parliament and wields clout over the Koli community, which constitutes over 22% of Gujarat’s six crore population.

Bavalia had met Congress president Rahul Gandhi less than a fortnight back to express his unhappiness over the state of affairs in Gujarat under the young leadership, including president Amit Chavda and leader of opposition Paresh Dhanani.

After handing over his papers to Gujarat assembly speaker Rajendra Trivedi, Bawalia, a four-time MLA from Jasdan constituency in Rajkot district, reached the BJP’s state headquarters ‘Shree Kamalam’ and met the party’s state president Jitu Vaghani and two other cabinet ministers.

Bawalia was elected to the Lok Sabha from Rajkot during the 2009 elections.

His resignation comes days after another leader from Rajkot, former legislator Indranil Rajyaguru, quit alleging that the Congress leadership ignored the aspirations of several party seniors.

(With agency inputs)