Assam: BJP candidate from Golaghat Ajanta Neog tests COVID-19 positive

GUWAHATI:

With barely a week left for the first phase of Assam Assembly elections, former minister and Bharatiya Janata Party candidate from Golaghat, Ajanta Neog has tested positive for COVID-19 on March 20.

Neog had undergone a COVID-19 test on March 19, a day ahead of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Chabua on Saturday.

She is currently under home isolation.

This is the second time in seven months that Neog, a minister during the three terms of the Congress government from 2001 to 2016, had tested positive for the virus.

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A sitting MLA from Golaghat, who had on December 29 last year joined the saffron party after quitting the Congress, Neog submitted her nomination papers for Golaghat constituency last week.

She will contest once against Bitupan Saikia of Congress.

Interestingly, Neog had defeated Saikia, who was in BJP in 2016.

“I have joined BJP because the party has a vision,” she had said when she joined the saffron party.

“Unfortunately, Congress, with which I was associated for 20 years, seems to have lost the connect it once had with the people of the state,” she said.

(Edited by Christopher Gatphoh)