On Sunday, Arvinder Singh Lovely, the chief of the Congress’s Delhi party unit resigned from his post, citing interference by the general secretary-in-charge and the alliance with Delhi’s AAP as reasons behind his decision.
As per the resignation letter to Mallikarjun Kharge, Lovely felt handicapped and wouldn’t be able to continue with the presidency of Delhi’s congress unit.
Further, he cited various instances that led to this decision. He revealed that various party leaders objected to the way Deepak Babaria (AICC in-charge of Delhi & Haryana) functioned. He also claimed that he was under huge pressure to remove those leaders who didn’t agree with Babaria’s ways.
Lovely also cited the Congress-AAP alliance for Lok Sabha elections in Delhi as the reason behind his resignation. Claimed that this move was heavily opposed by the party workers. “The Delhi Congress Unit was against an alliance with a party (AAP) which was formed on the sole basis of leveling false, fabricated, and malafide corruption charges against the Congress. Despite that, the party decided to ally with the AAP in Delhi,” said Arvinder Singh lovely.
According to the former party chief, many AAP ministers are in jail for the corruption charges. Despite this, Congress still went ahead with the alliance. Concluding that if he cannot protect the interests of party workers in his position then he has no reason to continue as the chief of the party’s unit.
He also alleged that the party gave tickets to those candidates, who were unfamiliar to Delhi’s congress workers.
Possibly talking about the candidature of Udit Raj from northwest Delhi and Kanhaiya Kumar from Northeast Delhi. Criticizing the latter, he also alleged that he once praised Arvind Kejriwal who is in jail now. “The candidate from Northeast Delhi has also been giving media bytes falsely praising the Delhi CM, in direct contravention of the party line and local party workers’ beliefs,” he said.
As per the sources, the party’s decision to field Kanhaiya Kumar and Udit Raj for the election had not gone down with many of the congress’s party leaders. Congress is in a seat-sharing alliance with the Aam Aadmi Party with a 4:3 formula for the Lok Sabha elections.
While AAP is contesting on four out of seven seats- West Delhi, South Delhi, East Delhi, and New Delhi. Congress on the other hand will fight on three seats- Northeast Delhi, Northwest Delhi, and Chandni Chowk.
Arvinder Singh earlier worked in various ministerial roles under former Delhi CM Sheila Dikshit. Later he joined BJP for a short time in April 2017. Then he came back to the Congress Party in 2018 where he was the party chief of Delhi’s unit since 2013.