In a major setback to the Congress in Delhi ahead of the Lok Sabha polls, Delhi Pradesh Congress Committee (DPCC) president Arvinder Singh Lovely resigned from his post citing various issues including, alliance with Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and selection of party candidates for North West Delhi and North East Delhi parliamentary seats.

Lovely through a letter to Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge announced his resignation from the post of party’s Delhi unit chief. However, he has not resigned from the party.

In his letter to Kharge, Lovely said, “With a heavy heart I write the present letter to you finding myself ‘handicapped’ and unable to continue as the President of the Delhi party unit. All unanimous decisions taken by the senior Delhi Congress leaders have been unilaterally vetoed by the AICC General Secretary (Delhi in-charge).”

He claimed that since his appointment as the president, the party’s Delhi In-charge has not allowed him to make any senior appointments in the DPCC.

Mentioning about the Congress-AAP alliance, Lovely said, “The Delhi Congress unit was against an alliance with a party which was formed on the sole basis of levelling false, fabricated and malafide corruption charges against the Congress and in turn, whose half of the cabinet ministers are presently in jail on corruption charges. Despite that, the party made a decision to ally with the AAP in Delhi.”

The Congress and AAP have formed alliances in Delhi and other states for the Lok Sabha elections. As per the seat sharing, the Congress is contesting in three and AAP in four out of the seven parliamentary seats in Delhi.

On selection of party candidates in Delhi, he said, “Out of these 3 seats, while rejecting the views of the PCC, all Observers and the local party workers, the North-West Delhi and North East Delhi seats were given to two 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 two candidates was made by the High Command, the PCC was not even intimated before the formal announcement,” Lovely said.

Kanhaiya Kumar is Congress candidate from North East Delhi LS seat and Udit Raj is party’s North-West Delhi parliamentary constituency.

He further said, “The candidate from North-East Delhi has also been giving media bytes falsely praising the Delhi CM (Arvind Kejriwal), 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 sector.”

” In such a situation , 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, tender my resignation from the post of DPCC president,” he said.

Voting in seven parliamentary seats in Delhi is scheduled to be held on 25th May.