BHOPAL : Lok Sabha polls seem to have divided old political families on party lines in Madhya Pradesh. Kankar Munjare, former MP and now BSP candidate from Balaghat seat, has left his home to stay away from his wife Anubha Munjare, a Congress MLA. Kankar, who won from Balaghat in 1989, has shifted to a hut till the polling day. Balaghat is among the six seats in the state, which will vote on April 19.
“I cannot live under the same roof till the polling day with my wife who has a different political ideology. Two people with different ideologies living under the same roof would be seen as a kind of match-fixing,” said Kankar. “I will return home after the polling day.”
Anubha, who defeated seven-time BJP MLA and former minister Gourishankar Bisen in 2023 assembly polls, sounds hurt by her husband’s gesture. She said they lived together during the assembly polls, when Kankar unsuccessfully contested as a GGP candidate. “Why now this sudden change of heart, three decades after the marriage, in the name of political ideology?” she asked. “I will campaign for my party candidate Samrat Saraswat,” Anubha said. In Chhindwara constituency, the Saxena family headed by ex-minister Deepak Saxena has been loyal to former CM and nine-time former MP Kamal Nath for over four decades. But things have changed now. Deepak and his younger son Ajay Saxena have joined the BJP and are set to work for party candidate Vivek Sahu ‘Bunty’.
Saxena’s elder son Jai is campaigning with MP and Congress candidate Nakul Nath. In Guna, Rao Yadvendra Singh Yadav is the Congress candidate against union minister and four-time former MP Jyotiraditya Scindia.
The family of former BJP MLA Late Rao Deshraj Singh Yadav seems divided on party lines. Yadvendra’s younger brother Rao Ajay Pratap Singh Yadav is siding with Scindia. While Balaghat and Chhindwara go to polls April 19, Guna will vote in the third phase on May 7.