Congress leader & former Minister Harshvardhan joins BJP

Mumbai: Congress leader and former Maharashtra minister Harshavardhan Patil joined the BJP on Wednesday.

Patil, 56, joined the saffron party at an event in south Mumbai in the presence of Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, who said he had been waiting for Patil to cross over for the last five years.

Fadnavis also indicated that Patil will be the BJP's candidate from Indapur Assembly seat in Pune district in the elections next month.

Patil's exit is the second major blow to the Congress in the state. Radhakrishna Vikhe Patil, another senior leader, left the party after the Lok Sabha polls and became a cabinet minister in the Fadnavis government.

Patil, four-time MLA from Indapur, had lost the 2014 Assembly election by a slender margin to the Nationalist Congress Party's (NCP) Dattatrey Bharne. The Congress and NCP had contested the 2014 elections separately.