Punjab Congress crisis: Rahul Gandhi says no meeting scheduled with Navjot Sidhu

Rahul Gandhi had held one-to-one meetings with more than 20 leaders, including ministers, MPs and MLAs, from Punjab last week as part of ongoing efforts to find a solution to factionalism in the state unit of the party.

Rahul Gandhi on Tuesday denied that there was any meeting scheduled with Punjab Congress leader Navjot Singh Sidhu, a day after former minister’s aide claimed he will meet the Gandhis in Delhi vis a vis the internal conflict within the state unit of the party.

Sidhu, said to have left for the national capital to meet the Gandhis, did not respond to phone calls and messages.

“No meeting with Sidhu,” Rahul told reporters waiting outside his Tughlak Lane bungalow in Delhi, as he left for his mother and Congress president Sonia Gandhi’s residence on 10 Janpath.

The question on possible meeting with Sidhu arose due to his aide claiming on Monday that the Amritsar East MLA would meet Rahul and party general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra in Delhi.

Sidhu, said to have left for the national capital to meet the Gandhis, did not respond to phone calls and messages.

Rahul Gandhi had held one-to-one meetings with more than 20 leaders, including ministers, MPs and MLAs, from Punjab last week as part of ongoing efforts to find a solution to factionalism in the state unit of the party. A three-member committee constituted by Congress President Sonia Gandhi had suggested in its report on June 10 that Sidhu should be suitably accommodated in the state unit.

However, the former minister, who has been critical of chief minister Captain Amarinder Singh for months, upped the ante about a week ago with a spate of interviews in which he accused Amarinder of colluding with Badals. Sidhu, whose relations with Amarinder were frosty from the start, had quit the state cabinet in 2019 after his portfolio was changed.