Lucknow, Jan 10 (IANS): In yet another jolt to the Congress, the party national secretary Imran Masood announced on Monday that he would join Samajwadi Party (SP).

"Under the prevailing political conditions, we need to support the SP to prevent the division of votes of like-minded people and provide good governance in Uttar Pradesh to put it on the path of development and progress," he said.

Masood said that although Congress General Secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra was working hard in Uttar Pradesh, the party is weak is the state.

He claimed the Congress had given him "honour and respect", but "it is the need of the hour to work together to support a similar ideology to prevent the division of votes of youths, women and farmers who have similar thinking".

SP spokesman Abdul Hafiz Gandhi said: "This trend of people from various parties moving towards SP is an indication of who is coming to power. Most of the disgruntled leaders of the BSP, the Congress, and the BJP are joining our party. There must be a strong wave in favour of the SP, and that is why leaders from other parties are trusting the visionary leadership of Akhilesh Yadav."

Several leaders have left the Congress in recent months. From Jitin Prasada, to Annu Tandon to Laliteshpati Tripathi, these leaders have expressed their resentment at the leadership's failure to address issues.

Masood had been seeking a tie-up between the Congress and SP for the upcoming Assembly polls.

He had won in 2007 as an independent and fought from Nakur in the 2012 Assembly polls on a Congress ticket, but lost. He joined the SP in 2013, only to return to the Congress the following year.

Masood had stirred controversy in 2014 when he threatened to kill Narendra Modi when the latter was campaigning to be Prime Minister. He arrested for the comments.