By our correspondent
Agartala, March 12, 2019: Ruling BJP’s ally in Tripura, IPFT has pushed the ball into the court of BJP and threatened to contest in both the Lok Sabha seats unless BJP accepts their demand for sparing East Parliamentary constituency to IPFT.
“We held a meeting on Monday night and decided to stake claim for East LS Seat. As a ally of BJP, we made similar demand to All India BJP president Amit Shah and State BJP president Biplab Kumar Deb on earlier occasions – however, nothing conclusive emerged so far. In case, BJP fails to meet our demand we will field candidates in both West and East LS Seats”, said Mangal Debbarma, assistant general secretary of IPFT.
He, however, said that there would be no hitches in existing BJP-IPFT government in the State, even if IPFT goes solo in LS Polls.
Debbarma said, IPFT core committee has finalized names of candidates for both the Parliamentary seats in the State – he however, withheld the announcement of names of candidates.
Meanwhile, BJP’s national general secretary Ram Madhav is scheduled to arrive in Tripura tomorrow (March 13) and address its local ally – IPFT’s demand. Ram Madhav fresh from success in pacifying disgruntled ally AGP in Assam, is expected to solve the uncertainty.
“BJP will contest in both the seats as mentioned several times in the past by its national leaders. It remains how Ram Madhav deals with IPFT’s top brass. Local BJP leaders are confident that the issue will be settled amicably and BJP will secure support of IPFT for both the LS seats”, political analysts opined.
