Pune (Maharashtra), Oct 7 (IANS): Ahead of the Maharashtra Assembly polls, former Bharatiya Janata Party leader Harshvardhan Patil, his daughter Ankita Patil and others joined the Nationalist Congress Party (SP) at a grand function in his home town Indapur, here on Monday.

The Patils and their supporters were welcomed formally to the party by NCP(SP) President Sharad Pawar, Working President Supriya Sule, MPs, MLAs and other bigwigs with posters near the venue heralding the new entrant as a ‘future minister’, which is construed as a blow to the BJP.

Last Friday, Patil quit the BJP and announced his intention to join the Sharad Pawar-led party along with all his office-bearers and supporters, giving a pre-election booster dose to the NCP(SP) which is a constituent of the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) opposition alliance.

“This is the wish of the people and the workers of Indapur…All the people of all castes and religions wanted to join the NCP(SP) and we are bowing to their wishes,” said Patil on discarding the BJP’s ‘Lotus’ and holding aloft the NCP (SP)’s poll symbol of ‘The Trumpeter’.

As the NCP(SP) top brass greeted him inside the venue, outside many banners and posters were seen proclaiming Patil as a ‘future minister’ indicating that he is likely to contest as the party’s candidate from Indapur against the ruling ally Nationalist Congress Party’s sitting MLA Dattatray V. Bharne.

Incidentally, Patil has been a four-time veteran elected from Indapur, thrice as an Independent (1995,1999, 2004) and once as a Congress nominee (2009), but in 2019, he quit the Congress and contested on a BJP ticket, and lost with a wafer-thin margin to Bharne.

His daughter Ankita Patil, a former Pune Zilla Parishad Member, and all the followers of the father-daughter duo have also picked up the NCP(SP) flag for the upcoming state polls.

Uncertain about getting a nomination from Indapur as the seat falls in the Ajit Pawar-led NCP quota, Patil was peeved with the BJP for not putting its foot down in the matter and subsequently held meetings with Sharad Pawar before joining NCP(SP).

Interestingly, Patil’s entry has led to some heartburns among certain NCP(SP) leaders and party toppers are making efforts to mollify them and ward off any potential damage ahead of the polls.