Gujarat deputy CM Nitin Patel

NEW DELHI: Congress on Monday sprang a surprise by offering the chief minister’s job to senior BJP member and deputy CM Nitin Patel if he could engineer a split in BJP and defect with about 20 MLAs, reports Kapil Dave .

Congress made this offer after Patel, while speaking at a function on Sunday, hinted that he was being isolated in BJP. The deputy CM had said: “You must be watching on television, or reading in the newspapers. On the one hand, there is everybody, on the other, I am alone.” A day later, Congress MLA Virji Thummar , while addressing Patel in the assembly and, said: “We heard that you have become lonely in BJP. You can join Congress with 15 to 20 MLAs and become CM in a Congress government.”

