Taking moral responsibility for cross-voting in legislative council elections, all the 11 Bharatiya Janata Party members of legislative assembly in Jammu and Kashmir today resigned and authorised the party central leadership to decide their fates.
"We (11 MLAS) have resigned and submitted our resignation letters to the party high command tonight to either conduct a probe or decide our fate", deputy jeader of BJP legislature party, Jugal Kishore Sharma, told mediapersons.
Seven out of 11 BJP legislators voted for the candidates of National Conference-Congress alliance which won five out of the six seats for which elections were held and the lone BJP candidate Ranjit Singh polled only four votes.
"We have addressed our resignation letters to the speaker of the assembly but handed them over to O P Kohli, party general secretary incharge of party affairs in the state and general secretary J P Nadha to either conduct a probe or forward the same to the speaker for accpetance", Sharma said admitting it as the "biggest embarrassment and black-spot" on BJP.
He said 7 out of 11 BJP's MLAS voted against the party's official candidate and in favour of ruling National Conference and Congress candidates. Ashok Khajuria, the chief whip of BJP in the Assembly, who had issued a whip to party legislators to vote for the party candidate in the elections, alleged the 11 MLAs "sold themselves for monetary or other consideration".
