Former leaders of the National Conference Party Devender Rana and Surjit Singh Slathia joined the BJP on Monday at its headquarters in New Delhi. Union ministers Dharmendra Pradhan, Hardeep Singh Puri and Jitendra Singh were present at the occasion.
Rana, the former head of NCP's Jammu division, resigned from it only a day ago. The younger brother of Union minister Jitendra Singh, he had also served as a political advisor to former Jammu and Kashmir chief minister and National Conference (NC) leader Omar Abdullah. Rana has been advocating for the Jammu declaration, a joint declaration of various political, social and business organisations. It calls for the restoration of statehood for the Jammu region and not the whole of Jammu and Kashmir. The Centre revoked J and K's special status in 2019. The state was further bifurcated into union territories of Jammu and Kashmir, and Ladakh.
BJP general secretary in-charge for Jammu and Kashmir Tarun Chugh and its Jammu and Kashmir unit chief Ravinder Raina welcomed the two new members into the party.