Comedian Raju Srivastava who rejected SP LS ticket, now joins BJP

Kanpur: A week after he returned the Samajwadi Party Kanpur’s Lok Sabha ticket, standup comedian and actor Raju Srivastava has joined the BJP. “The Samajwadi Party workers in Kanpur are getting increasingly insecure about their political career. Mulayam Singh intervened in the matter but to no effect. They are interfering in my work and bullying me even now, hence I decided to take a call and returned the ticket,” he had said on 11 March. [caption id=“attachment_1441007” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] Representational image[/caption] The Samajwadi Party had announced Raju Srivastava as its party candidate from Kanpur in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections last year. His name had been formally announced by SP national general secretary and spokesman Ram Gopal Yadav. In addition to Srivastava, former Congress leader Jagdambika Pal has also joined the BJP. “Jagdambika Pal’s decision to join us will only strengthen our party further. I welcome him,” said party president Rajnath Singh. However, BJP workers from Domariyaganj, which is Pal’s Lok Sabha constituency, and its surrounding areas staged a sit-in at the BJP headquarters, demanding a denial of a ticket to the leader, who recently quit the Congress as well as the Lok Sabha. This story was originally published in News18.com