MP Congress chief's niece quits party, to contest as independent

JHABUA: In a setback for Madhya Pradesh Congress president Kantilal Bhuria, his niece and state Congress secretary Kalawati Bhuria today quit the party in protest against the granting of a poll ticket to the sitting MLA from Jhabua, Xavier Medha.

Kalawati, a tribal leader, alleged at a press conference that Medha had never worked for the party and did not care for the workers.

She said she had filed nomination as an independent candidate from Jhabua for the November 25 Assembly polls in the state and claimed that a total of 2,000 members had joined her in resigning from the party.

Another Congress leader, the state vice-president of its backward classes cell, Suraj Jaiswal, too, quit the party in Jabalpur in protest against poll tickets to "undeserving candidates".

Jaiswal, a former Deputy Mayor of the Jabalpur Municipal Corporation, said he was joining Janata Dal (U) and claimed that Congress would lose the Assembly polls in Madhya Pradesh.