Congress' Ashok Chavan, a former chief minister, has denied the rumours. (File)
Congress leader Ashok Chavan is currently in Nanded supervising the preparations to welcome the 'Bharat Jodo Yatra' led by Rahul Gandhi, a senior state party leader said on Thursday.
Speculation was rife a few days ago about the possibility of Mr Chavan joining the BJP after he met Maharashtra deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis on the occasion of the Ganesh festival.
But Mr Chavan, a former chief minister, denied the rumours.
Former state Congress chief Manikrao Thakre told news agency PTI on Thursday that Mr Chavan was not upset with the party and he was in fact busy supervising the preparations to welcome the Bharat Jodo Yatra in Maharashtra in November.
The Yatra will cover 350 km in the state, passing through central Maharashtra districts of Nanded, Hingoli, Washim, and eastern Maharashtra's Buldhana before entering Madhya Pradesh.
Mr Thakre is heading a training camp for party workers from the district and taluka levels to apprise them of the objective of the yatra. He has held meetings in Nanded, Hingoli, Washim, and Buldhana in the last two days.
Mr Gandhi will address a rally at Jalgaon-Jamod in Buldhana district, he said.
Besides 118 'Yatris' (participants) who would be walking the entire route spanning 12 states, 100 others will join the rally from Deglur to Buldhana in Maharashtra.
Mr Chavan was among the dozen Congress MLAs who were not present in the state Assembly during the trust vote of the Eknath Shinde government which came to power after the collapse of the Shiv Sena-NCP-Congress coalition government in the state.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)