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Delhi Congress chief Lovely resigns citing differences with party
Out of the seven seats in Delhi, AAP is contesting four and Congress three seats – North East Delhi, North West Delhi and Chandni Chowk
New Delhi: Delhi Congress chief Arvinder Singh Lovely resigned from his post on April 27 citing differences with Delhi Congress in-charge Deepak Babaria and the party’s alliance with chief minister Arvind Kejriwal-led Aam Aadmi Party (AAP).
Lovely said the Delhi Congress unit was against an alliance with the AAP “which was formed on the sole basis of levelling false, fabricated and malafide corruption charges against the Congress Party and in turn, whose half of the cabinet ministers are presently in jail on corruption charges, despite that, the Congress formed an alliance with AAP.”
The development comes as a blow to the Delhi Congress weeks before the Lok Sabha polls, and days after former Delhi cabinet minister Raj Kumar Chauhan resigned citing “humiliation” by the Delhi Congress in charge.
The seat-sharing agreement for Lok Sabha polls between the Congress-led INDIA bloc in Delhi between AAP and Congress was finalised in February. The two parties have allied for the Lok Sabha polls in Delhi, Chandigarh, Haryana, Gujarat and Goa.
Out of the seven seats of Delhi, AAP is contesting four and Congress three seats – North East Delhi, North West Delhi and Chandni Chowk.
Congress has fielded youth leader Kanhaiya Kumar from North East, former BJP MP Udit Raj from North West and Congress leader JP Aggrawal from Chandni Chowk seat. Sections of leaders in Delhi Congress have opposed the fielding of Udit Raj and Kanhaiya Kumar as party candidates calling them ‘outsiders.’
Meanwhile, the Bharatiya Janata Party has fielded candidates on all seven constituencies. In the previous two Lok Sabha elections held in 2014 and 2019, the Bharatiya Janata Party won all seven seats in Delhi, with a vote share exceeding 50 per cent.
Citing further reasons for his resignation, Lovely said, “All unanimous decisions taken by the senior Delhi Congress leaders have been unilaterally vetoed by the AICC General Secretary (Delhi In-charge), and since his appointment as DPCC president, the AICC General Secretary (Delhi In-charge) has not allowed me to make any senior appointments in the DPCC including to appoint all block presidents in the city even though over 150 blocks in Delhi do not presently have a block president.”
A former Delhi cabinet minister, Lovley was appointed the Delhi Congress chief in August 2023. HT reached out to Lovely but he refused to comment on the development.
Another Delhi Congress leader, however, said Lovely would not be joining any other party.
In a letter sent to Congress national president Mallikarjun Kharge, Lovely mentioned reasons, including fielding ‘outsider’ candidates from North West and North East Lok Sabha seats and Kanhaiya Kumar “falsely praising Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal”.
Lovely mentioned that for the three seats that Congress got in alliance with AAP, the Congress has fielded two outsiders – Kanhaiya Kumar and Udit Raj from North East Delhi and North West Delhi seats, respectively.
“Out of these 3 seats, while rejecting the views of the PCC, all Observers and the Local Party Workers, the North-West Delhi and Northeast Delhi seats were given to 2 Candidates who were total strangers to the Delhi Congress and the Party Policies. It is the prerogative of the High Command to have a final say on the Party Candidates, however, shockingly, once the decision in regards to the aforesaid 2 Candidates was made by the High Command, the PCC was not even intimated before the formal announcement so that I could at least take some remedial steps and pacify the local State Leaders thereby stalling any local party unrest,” said Lovely.
“Till date, no AICC Senior Leader has spoken to me to pacify the local leaders to ensure that the elections are conducted smoothly. On my own accord, I have been approaching every dismayed leader and party cadre to keep the party intact,” the letter reads.
Lovely said in the wake of protests at the Congress office against fielding Udit Raj from North West Delhi Deepak Babaria asked him to suspend Raj Kumar Chauhan (Ex- Delhi Minister), and Surender Kumar (Ex-MLA) and other party functionaries from the Party for allegedly mobilising the protest.
“The candidate from North-East Delhi has also been giving media bytes falsely praising the Delhi CM, in direct contravention of the party line and the local party workers’ beliefs In direct contradiction to the true factual position and the misery of Delhi Citizens, he endorsed the false propaganda of AAP in regard to the supposed works done by them in the education, health, road and electricity sectors. Such ill-thought and factually incorrect statements have not gone down well with the local unit of the party who have an inherent understanding that the alliance was not done in appreciation of AAP’s false propaganda of the development of Delhi and was in fact, a “compromise” to improve the chances of victory for the party as part of the National Alliance. It appears that the North East Delhi Candidate is unaware of the fact that admittedly, the condition of schools, hospitals and public infrastructure in Delhi, under the AAP rule, has severely worsened as compared to the development work done under Late Sheila Dikshit Ji’s Congress regime,” Lovely wrote in the letter.
“…….as a consequence of the aforementioned situation, since I cannot protect the interests of the Party Workers, I see no reason to continue in the said post. Therefore, with great regret and an extremely leaden heart, I, Arvinder Singh Lovely, do hereby tender my resignation from the post of DPCC President,” Lovely stated in the letter.
No immediate response was available from AAP and the BJP. The story will be updated when the responses are available.
Lovely had previously resigned from Congress in 2017 ahead of the municipal polls and joined the BJP, however, he returned to the Congress a few months later.
