'Tiger Zinda Hai', says Shivraj Chouhan after Champai Soren joins BJP

"Tiger Zinda Hai", said Union minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan on Friday while welcoming former Jharkhand chief minister Champai Soren to BJP at a party function here in Ranchi. Soren is known as "Kolhan's Tiger" in Jharkhand, who contributed actively to the Jharkhand movement with JMM supremo Shibu Soren.

Former JMM leader Champai Soren joined the BJP on Friday, two days after he resigned from the JMM citing "dissatisfaction" with the party's current style of functioning and "bitter humiliation".

"Champai Soren had fought a very tough battle for the creation of Jharkhand and it was due to his efforts that former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee created the state," he said.


He said that Champai nurtured Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM) like a gardener but he was treated stepmotherly.

"When Champai was the chief minister of Jharkhand, he took tough decisions against middlemen. This irked JMM and they started humiliating him. He had been trying to free Jharkhand from corruption," Chouhan said.

He said that BJP and Champai have resolved not to let Jharkhand and its people be insulted any more.

Hitting out at the Hemant Soren-led government, Chouhan said the JMM-Congress alliance government "did not fulfil its promises" whether its five lakh jobs or unemployment allowances.

"The corrupt JMM-led government will be uprooted and BJP government will be formed in Jharkhand after the election," he said.