He resigned from the party, ending his seven-year journey with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). Former chief of Tamil Nadu K. Annamalai This was formally accepted by party chief Nitin Nabin on Friday (June 5, 2026). As efforts to retain him in the saffron camp fail, the IPS-turned-politician is set to launch his own regional party. His exit has been a possibility for a long time, as he had pushed the BJP to part ways with the AIADMK and contest the Lok Sabha elections alone in 2024.
“Nobody can put a gun to anyone’s head and force a person to remain in the party. If I like I will stay or if I don’t like I will leave and continue farming,” Mr Annamalai had announced in November last year when the BJP had resumed alliance talks with AIADMK, seven months after appointing Nainar Nagendran as BJP Tamil Nadu president in place of Annamalai.
The last high-profile exit from the BJP was in November last year when former Union minister RK Singh was suspended after criticizing the BJP’s choice of candidates for the Bihar state elections, pointing out their criminal background and corruption. After serving a six-year suspension, Mr Singh left the party He has since promised to launch a Bihar-centric party that will include ‘honest, educated and caste-free’ individuals.
Over the past few years, many high-profile leaders have left the BJP to form their own parties. An in-depth look at their journey reveals that most of them have either parted ways and rejoined the party or merged their organizations with the BJP. Some people have moved to other parties.
From Jan Sangh to BJP
BJP originates from the split of Janata Party in 1980. The party’s constituents – Jan Sangh, Congress (O), Socialist Party and Bharatiya Lok Dal (BLD) went their separate ways after the election defeat in 1980. Refusing to make changes to the Jana Sangh’s ideological parent – ​​the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), the Jana Sangh was reformulated. Bharatiya Janata Party On April 6, 1980, Atal Bihari Vajpayee became its first president.
Shankarsingh Vaghela (1996)
When the BJP successfully wrested Gujarat from the Congress in 1995, senior BJP leader Shankar Singh Vaghela rebelled against Keshubhai Patel, the BJP’s pick for the post of CM. Due to many MLAs supporting Mr. Vaghela as Chief Minister, Mr. Suresh Mehta replaced Mr. Patel as Chief Minister in October 1995. However, the rift in the BJP continued and Mr Vaghela rebelled once again in September 1996, leading 105 of the 121 BJP MLAs to a resort in Khajuraho in Congress-ruled Madhya Pradesh. Soon the Suresh Mehta government was dismissed and President’s rule was imposed in Gujarat.
By breaking away 47 MLAs from BJP, Mr. Vaghela formed his own party Rashtriya Janata Party which was supported by Congress. He was sworn in as the twelfth Chief Minister of Gujarat, but lasted only a year. Deciding not to contest the 1998 Gujarat state elections, he immediately merged his organization with the Congress after the BJP returned to power. After nearly a decade in the Congress, Mr Vaghela rebelled against veteran Congress leader Ahmed Patel and cross-voted in the 2017 Rajya Sabha elections. He later left the party and founded a new party named Jan Vikalp Morcha, but was not recognized as an official political party by the Election Commission.
After a brief stint in the Nationalist Congress Party, he launched another organization named Praja Shakti Democratic Party to contest the 2022 Gujarat elections. However, later he had to bow down and decided to support Congress.
Kalyan Singh (1999)
Kalyan Singh, who oversaw the demolition of the Babri Masjid during his tenure as chief minister, was seen as the BJP leader who would realize his dream of building a Ram temple in Ayodhya. However, after a hung verdict in the 1997 Uttar Pradesh elections, Mr Singh was forced to share power with BSP chief Mayawati, angering factions with the BJP. When the BJP-BSP alliance was in turmoil between 1998 and 1999, Mr Singh faced an internal rebellion by upper caste BJP MLAs, leading the BJP central leadership to replace Mr Singh with Ram Prakash Gupta as Chief Minister.
Angered by his removal, Mr Singh began vocally criticizing then Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee. He alleged that the BJP had abandoned the issues it stood for and had become “Congressised” under Mr Vajpayee’s leadership, leading to his expulsion in December 1999. Within a few days, he formed his own organization ‘Rashtriya Kranti Party’ based on the ideology of Hindutva. His party won four seats in the 2002 elections and sat in the opposition along with the Samajwadi Party (SP). After the BJP-BSP government fell in 2003, Mr Singh formed an alliance with the SP and his son Rajveer Singh joined the cabinet of his long-time rival Mulayam Singh Yadav. He joined BJP back in 2004 and merged his organization with BJP.
In January 2009, Mr Singh once again left the BJP citing ‘humiliation at the hands of top party leaders’ and the party responded that it was Mr Singh’s ‘ideologically opposite’ alliance with the SP that caused the rift. In November 2009, Mr Yadav blamed SP’s alliance with Mr Singh for his defeat in the Firozabad Lok Sabha by-election. An angry Mr Singh left the alliance, launched another organization ‘Jan Kranti Party’ and appointed his son as its president. However, the organization was disbanded and merged into the BJP in 2013 as the party intensified its campaign for the 2014 Lok Sabha elections. The former UP CM rejoined the saffron party at a grand Modi rally in Lucknow in March 2014 and was later appointed governor of Rajasthan and Himachal Pradesh.
Uma Bharti (2005)
Known as the ‘Fiery Sanyasin of Khajuraho’, BJP’s Madhya Pradesh stalwart Uma Bharti had first expressed her desire to leave the party in 1992 amid infighting in the state unit of the party. While then BJP chief L K Advani managed to convince the ‘heroine of the Ram Janmabhoomi movement’ to remain in the saffron camp, Ms Bharti resigned from her Lok Sabha and party posts in 2000 after strong pressure to join the Union Cabinet. Four years later, he once again ‘quit politics’ after being forced to step down as Madhya Pradesh CM due to a non-bailable warrant issued against him in connection with the 1994 Hubli riots.
Because she became a vocal critic of his successor in Madhya Pradesh – Chief Minister Babulal Gaur, Mr Advani dismissed her in November 2004, but a month later she was reinstated as general secretary of the BJP at the behest of the top RSS leadership. Despite joining the BJP, Ms Bharti was not reinstated as chief minister and she continued to raise her voice against Mr Gaur’s successor – Shivraj Singh Chouhan. Due to his actions he was expelled from the BJP and the Bharatiya Janashakti Party (BJSP) was founded.
Claiming the support of RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat, Ms Bharti’s organization failed to make any political gains as Mr Chouhan retained the state in the 2008 state elections by winning 143 out of 230 seats. BJSP, on the other hand, won only five seats and Ms Bharti started moving towards rejoining the BJP. After he was formally readmitted back into the BJP on June 7, 2011, the BJSP merged with the BJP later that month. Since then, he has expressed regret at leaving the BJP and has held several ministries in the Modi cabinet. He is currently one of the vice presidents of the party.
Keshubhai Patel (2012)
Former CM angry with the growing stature of his disciple Narendra Modi in Gujarat Keshubhai Patel Left BJP to form Gujarat Parivartan Party. Opposing Mr Modi’s bid for a fourth term as chief minister in 2012, Mr Patel had alleged that the BJP had moved away from its principles and towards personal glorification. After his party failed to open its account in the 2013 state elections, he again joined the BJP in 2014 as Mr Modi moved to the central leadership. Until his death in 2020, Mr Patel remained in the BJP but left active politics.
BS Yediyurappa (2012)
BS Yediyurappa, the BJP’s tallest Lingayat leader in Karnataka – was forced to step down as Chief Minister on July 27, 2011 following pressure from the BJP central leadership, after being found guilty of illegal dealings with mining companies by the Lokayukta. After his resignation, Mr Yediyurappa left the BJP to form his own party, Karnataka Janata Paksha (KJP). In the 2013 state elections, the KJP made a dent in the BJP’s Lingayat votebank, winning six seats and restricting the saffron party to 40.
A thaw between Mr Yediyurappa and the BJP’s central leadership appeared in September 2013 when Mr Modi emerged as the BJP’s prime ministerial candidate. As the BJP intensified its Lok Sabha campaign, Mr Yediyurappa dissolved the KJP in January 2014 and returned to the saffron party. Since then, he has been elected as CM twice and has been promoted to the Central Parliamentary Board of the BJP.
Yashwant Sinha (2018)
Vajpayee veteran Yashwant Sinha, a former finance minister, had first resigned from party posts in June 2009 after the BJP failed to prevent the UPA government from being re-elected. Taking responsibility for the election defeat, he resigned from the post of BJP vice-president and member of the National Executive Committee and urged all party workers to resign from their posts so that ‘transparent, internal elections can be held for these posts’. However, he remained a BJP worker.
Almost a decade later, Mr Sinha left the BJP in 2018 after being sidelined by the BJP under the Modi-Shah leadership. Accusing the Modi government of weakening democratic institutions, Mr Sinha vowed to launch a nationwide campaign to “save democracy”.
Ahead of the Bihar elections, Mr Sinha along with Rashtriya Lok Samata Party (RLSP) leader Arun Kumar founded the Bharatiya Sab Log Party (BSLP). The organization contested 30 seats and failed to open its account. BSLP later merged with Chirag Paswan-led Lok Janshakti Party (Ram Vilas) (LJP(RV)) in 2022.
Opposing the BJP, Mr Sinha joined the Trinamool Congress (TMC) in 2021 as the saffron party campaigned for the West Bengal elections. He was jointly selected as the opposition candidate for the 2022 presidential elections, but lost to Draupadi Murmu by a margin of 2,96,626 votes. After the election defeat, he left TMC to launch ‘Atal Vichar Manch’ ahead of the 2024 Jharkhand elections. The party has not contested any elections yet.
