Arvinder Singh Lovely resigns as Delhi Congress chief, cites alliance with AAP

Delhi Congress president Arvinder Singh Lovely resigned from his post, party officials on Sunday said. In his resignation letter to Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge, Arvinder Singh Lovely cited the alliance with Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal-led Aam Aadmi Party for the Lok Sabha election 2024 as one of the reasons for his resignation.

“The Delhi Congress Unit was against an alliance with a party which was formed on the sole basis of leveling false, fabricated and malafide corruption charges against the Congress Party. Despite that, the Party made a decision to ally with the AAP in Delhi…,” Arvinder Singh Lovely wrote in his resignation letter.

Lovely had assumed charge of the post in August last year.

What Arvinder Singh Lovely wrote in resignation letter

In his letter, Arvinder Singh Lovely added that all unanimous decisions taken by the senior Delhi Congress leaders have been unilaterally vetoed by the AICC general secretary (Delhi in-charge).

“Since my appointment as DPCC President, the AICC General Secretary (Delhi In-charge) has not allowed me to make any senior appointments in the DPCC. My request for the appointment of a veteran leader as Media head of DPCC was blatantly rejected. To date, the AICC General Secretary (Delhi In-charge) has not allowed the DPCC to appoint all Block presidents in the city. Resultantly more than 150 blocks in Delhi do not presently have a Block President,” he said.

On Congress’s ally with AAP

On allying with the AAP, Lovely said, “We respected the Party’s final decision. Not only did I publicly back the decision, I also ensured that the full State Unit fell in line with the High Command’s final order. On instructions from AICC General Secretary (Organisation), I even went to the extent of visiting Kejriwal’s residence on the night of his Arrest along with Subash Chopra and Sandeep Dikshit, despite the same being against my position on the matter,” he added.

The former DPCC president also pointed out that pursuant to the alliance, the Delhi Congress was allotted three parliamentary seats to fight in the present General Elections.

He also highlighted the comments made by the North-East Delhi candidate (Kanhaiya Kumar), who “falsely” praised the Delhi CM and endorsed the works done by the AAP in the education, health, road and electricity sector.

“Such ill-thought and factually incorrect statements have not gone down well with the Local Party Unit since, the local party workers had 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,” Lovely said.

Lovely added that since he couldn’t protect the interests of the party workers, he saw no reason to continue in the said post.

Delhi Congress-AAP alliance for Lok Sabha polls

The seat-sharing agreement for Lok Sabha polls between the INDIA bloc partners in Delhi, AAP and Congress, was finalised on February. The AAP is contesting four seats, while the Congress fielded candidates in three constituencies.

The AAP is fighting in New Delhi, South Delhi, West Delhi, and East Delhi, while Chandni Chowk, North East Delhi, and North West Delhi went to the Congress.

Earlier, the AAP had offered the Congress just one of the seven Lok Sabha seats, bringing the discussions into a deadlock.

In the previous two Lok Sabha elections, held in 2014 and 2019, the BJP won all seven seats in Delhi, with a vote share exceeding 50 per cent.

The rapport between the two parties was hit after Arvind Kejriwal’s party declared that it would contest all the 14 Lok Sabha seats in Punjab and Chandigarh alone.

Arvinder Singh Lovely’s resignation comes days after former Delhi minister and All India Congress Committee member Rajkumar Chauhan resigned from the party following the meeting of the Delhi Congress’ disciplinary committee.

A party leader said that Chauhan, who was involved in an alteration with AICC Delhi in-charge Deepak Babria on Sunday, submitted his resignation on Wednesday morning.

The Delhi Congress’ disciplinary committee held a meeting on Tuesday and left it to the AICC to decide whether to take any action on complaints against Chauhan.