Kushboo Sundar joins BJP hours after quitting Congress, says Modi can take country 'to its glory'

Hours after quitting Congress, actor-turned-politician Kushboo Sundar, one of the party's most prominent defenders, joined the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Monday in Delhi. The former Congress spokesperson was with the party since 2014.Speaking to reporters at the joining ceremony, the actor from Tamil Nadu said she had come to the understanding over a period of time that if the nation has to move forward, then someone like Prime Minister Narendra Modi is needed to take the country "in the right direction and to its glory".A national spokesperson of the Congress, she resigned from the party protesting against what she called some leaders' "dictating terms" and "suppressing" her. Assembly polls are due in Tamil Nadu in the first half of the next year, and the BJP hopes her induction will be a boost to it, a PTI report notes.Sundar, a popular Tamil actor, who was with the DMK before joining the national party in 2014 sent her resignation letter to Congress' top leader Sonia Gandhi on Monday."A few elements seated at a higher level within the party, people who have no connectivity with the ground reality or public recognition are dictating terms and people like me who wanted to work for the party sincerely are being pushed and suppressed," she claimed.This development comes ahead of the Tamil Nadu Assembly polls that are slated to be held next year. According to The News Minute, Sundar was upset that she was not given a ticket in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections and BJP has promised to ensure a seat for her in the 2021 Assembly elections.The BJP has long been a marginal force in the southern state where two Dravidian parties, the AIADMK and the DMK, have been the main contenders for power.AICC Secretary In-Charge of Communications, Pranav Jha in a statement said: "Kushboo Sundar is hereby dropped as AICC spokesperson with immediate effect."The party she intended to join would not gain anything and her resignation was no loss to the Congress party, TNCC president KS Alagiri said in a statement.Though the party gave her importance and appointed her to the key position of national spokesperson, her involvement in party work over the past few months was "pretty less," Alagiri said.Sundar, however, said in her letter that she decided to end her association with the Congress party only after a long and thorough "thought process" over a period of timeShe joined the DMK in May 2010 and when she moved out, she had said that she was stressed when her dedication and hard work continued to be a one-way path.The 50-year old actor-politician had hit out at the BJP governments at the Centre and Uttar Pradesh in the Congress organised demonstration.On 10 October, the actor, on her Twitter handle, had given a hint about things to come, saying —As per The Indian Express, Sundar had first sparked off rumours of a rift with the Congress in July when she backed the Centre’s new National Education Policy. She had even tweeted an apology to party leader Rahul Gandhi for her differing views. Her tweet invited criticism from senior Congress leaders, including Tamil Nadu Congress President KS Alagiri, who said Sundar's comments show her immaturity.Kushboo, the wife of noted Tamil filmmaker Sundar C, became a household name in Tamil Nadu after the 1991 Tamil flick 'Chinna Thambi,' became a box-office hit in which she paired with actor Prabhu and she has been popular in television shows as well.With inputs from PTI