Former Punjab Pradesh Congress Committee (PPCC) chief Sunil Jakhar on Saturday quit the Grand Old Party in a dramatic style by announcing his resignation on Facebook Live. This development came a few hours after he had removed Congress from all his social media handles.
“This [Facebook live address] is going to be my parting gift to the party,” he said.
Jakhar had been stripped of his party posts for two years a fortnight back for “not toeing the party line.” Jakhar said that he was upset at the Congress decision as his family served the party for three generations for over a period of 50 years. A day after Jakhar tweeted that he would pour his heart out on Saturday, he resigned. Jakhar said the leaders had no intention of saving the party while calling the ongoing ‘Chintan Shiver’ as a mere formality. After the party’s debacle in the Uttar Pradesh state assembly elections earlier this year, Jakhar took an indirect dig at the Congress General Secretary in-charge of Uttar Pradesh Priyanka Gandhi Vadra. Jakhar also called Rahul Gandhi a ‘good person’ while warning him to distance himself from ‘sycophants’.
On the Congress’ choice of a Chief Ministerial face after the resignation of Captain Amarinder Singh, Jakhar had accused the party of listening to a certain Punjab leader.
After Congress lost to Aam Aadmi Party in Punjab earlier this year, Jakhar denounced former Chief Minister Charanjit Singh Channi as a liability. “Not the top brass, but his [Channi’s] own greed pulled him and the party down,” Jakhar had said in a tweet. Jakhar also hit out at Rajya Sabha MP Ambika Soni’s comment on ‘repercussions of having a Hindu chief minister in Punjab’ and blamed her for the party’s loss in Punjab.
Many within the party strongly objected to Jakhar’s remarks against Channi and the scheduled caste community during an interview. Jakhar defended himself by saying that his words were being used against him by taking them out of context.
According to an Indian Express report, Jakhar had accused his party for not choosing him as a chief ministerial candidate as he was a Hindu.
Jakhar was considered as one of the alternatives to Amarinder Singh after Singh had stepped down from the CM post.
Before quitting, Jakhar was yet to reply to a show-cause notice issued by the disciplinary action committee of the Congress last month alleging that he made “a derogatory statement against Congress leaders and also attributed motives to the leadership of thinking on communal lines.”
