AAP’s Uttarakhand CM candidate joins BJP

Dehradun: Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) chief ministerial candidate in the recently concluded assembly polls, Colonel Ajay Kothiyal (retired) on Tuesday joined the Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP).
Kothiyal joined the BJP here in the presence of Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami. He quit the AAP last week.
A retired Army officer, Kothiyal fought the Uttarakhand elections from AAP ticket from Uttarkashi, but he lost to Suresh Chauhan of the BJP. Kothiyal finished as a distant third getting around 10.33 percent votes.
In his resignation letter last week, he had said he has quit keeping in mind the sentiments of ex-servicemen, ex-paramilitary, elderly, women, youth and intellectuals.
BJP retained power in Uttarakhand winning 47 seats, getting around 44 percent of the vote share in the recently held polls. The Congress got around 37 percent votes, and won 19 seats. AAP failed to get even as single seat and polled around 3.31 percent votes.
In 2017, Congress had won 11 seats, and got around 33 percent votes while BJP’s vote share was around 46 percent in 2017.
(UNI)