Friday, September 9 2005 10:00 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

Ahmedabad: Crisis has surfaced within the Gujarat Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), with more than 45 office bearers of the Ankleshwar unit of the party threatening to resign after a tainted Congress leader was inducted into the party on Wednesday night (Sept 7, 2005), sources said here.

The office bearers of the BJP's office at Ankleshwar were unhappy that ex-Congress leader Hiralal Modi was inducted into the party and nobody was even consulted before the induction.

Accusing party General Secretary, Purshottam Rupala, of behaving in an autocratic fashion, Jayanti Patel, an ex-MLA from the region told PTI, "He (Rupala) did not even consult a single party office bearer, MLA or leader in Ankleshwar before inducting Modi."

Patel said he and other office bearers of Ankleshwar BJP, including the city unit President Harendrasinh Solanki, were sending their joint resignation letter to party President Vaju Vala in a short while.

BJP members were furious over the decision to induct Modi as they had opposed him tooth and nail in connection with a fraud case of a local cooperative bank.

Modi, the ex-President of Ankleshwar cooperative bank is accused in a fraud concerning the bank and following pressure from the local BJP, a police case was also registered against him.

When contacted Rupala admitted that Modi was inducted into the party but denied any knowledge of office bearers threatening to resign.