Bollywood actor Urmila Matondkar, who had contested the 2019 Lok Sabha elections on a Congress ticket and quit the party later, will join the Shiv Sena on Tuesday, a party functionary said. Harshal Pradhan, a close aide of Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray, on Sunday said that Matondkar will join the party in the CM’s presence.
Matondkar’s name has been forwarded to Governor B S Koshyari by the Shiv Sena for nomination to the Legislative Council from the governor’s quota. The names of 11 others have also been forwarded by the three-party Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government for their nomination from the governor’s quota. The governor is yet to approve the list of 12 names.
Matondkar had unsuccessfully contestedthe 2019 Lok Sabha election from Mumbai North constituency as a Congress candidate. However, she had later quit the party over the functioning of the Mumbai unit of the Congress. Recently, she had criticised actor Kangana Ranaut for comparing Mumbai with Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK) and the nepotism issue.
