Jolt for NCP as MP walks over to Shiv Sena

Mumbai, March 19 (IANS) The Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) received a pre-election jolt when its sitting Lok Sabha member from Beed constituency walked over to the Shiv Sena here Thursday.

The NCP's Jaisingrao Gaekwad Patil had trounced the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Prakash S. Solanke by over 47,000 votes in the 2004 elections.

Thursday morning, Patil called on Shiv Sena executive president Uddhav Thackeray before announcing his decision to join that party, according to a Sena source.

Patil's move was apparently prompted by the NCP's decision to deny him a re-nomination from the Beed constituency, which was considered a party stronghold.

The NCP has now announced the candidature of Ramesh Adaskar while the BJP has put up senior leader Gopinath Munde from Beed constituency. Incidentally, Munde and Patil are bitter political rivals in the constituency.

However, since the BJP, alliance partner of the Shiv Sena, has declared Munde's candidature from Beed, it is unclear from which constituency will the Sena now nominate Patil for the poll.