Congress leader Jitin Prasada joined the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Wednesday, in a shot in the arm for the saffron party as it prepares for assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh scheduled for early next year.
Jitin Prasada joined the BJP in presence of Union Minister Piyush Goyal and its chief spokesperson Anil Baluni.
The 47-year-old Prasada, a former Union minister, comes from a well-known Brahmin family of Uttar Pradesh and was serving as the Congress leader in charge of West Bengal before joining the BJP.
His father Jitendra Prasada was a noted Congress leader.
With the Congress in dire straits in Uttar Pradesh and he himself losing the Lok Sabha polls twice in a row, Prasada's decision to join the BJP may help him politically at a time when the saffron party is working overtime to boost its ranks in preparation for the assembly polls.
It will also help the BJP keep Brahmins, a section of whom are said to be unhappy with the party in Uttar Pradesh, in good humour in the politically important state of India, party sources said.
Speculation was rife even during the 2019 Lok Sabha elections of Jitin Prasada joining the BJP, but it is believed that the Congress leadership had then managed to persuade him against quitting the party.
Jitin Prasada, 47, is the second high-profile former Rahul Gandhi aide to defect to the BJP after Jyotiraditya Scindia left last year. He had denied rumours in 2019 that he was leaving the Congress. Sources say at the time Priyanka Gandhi Vadra had convinced him to stay.
The former Lok Sabha MP from Dhaurahra in Uttar Pradesh was one of the Congress's top leaders in India's most politically vital state, and is a big loss ahead of elections due in less than a year.