Former Union Minister and a Congress leader for over three decades, RPN Singh's exit from the party has come as a massive blow for the grand old party just few days before the Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections and just a day after he was named a star campaigner of the party.
A section of the party leaders felt that the exit of Singh, who was incharge of party affairs in Jharkhand, is"good riddance" since he was allegedly working against the Congress-JMM combine in the State. However, another section termed it as yet another alarm bell for the party leadership to wake up from slumber to put the house in order.
The Congress late in the evening appointed Avinash Pandey as the AICC general secretary incharge in place of Singh.
Singh, a key Kurmi OBC leader from eastern UP, is the second big exit for the Congress in the state after Jitin Prasada, who is now a minister in the Yogi Adityanath-led BJP government in UP.
He had been giving enough indications to leave the Congress since the run up to 2019 General Elections.
AICC sources said he had not been attending the party meetings in the last several months though he was full time incharge for the Jharkhand Congress. Soon after Singh announced his resignation from the party, Jharkhand Barkagaon MLA Amba Prasad alleged that Singh had since several months been attempting to dislodge the Congress-JMM coalition government and that there were reports about him being in touch with BJP leaders.
"The party leadership had been cautioned on several occasions about his anti-party activities. Every true member of Congress is happy with him (RPN) going to BJP," Amba Prasad tweeted.
RPN posted his resignation letter addressed to Congress president Sonia Gandhi, "Today, at a time, we are celebrating the formation of our great Republic, I begin a new chapter in my political journey. Jai Hind."
Kunwar Ratanjit Pratap Narain Singh, popularly known as Raja Saheb of Padrauna, was a former Minister of State in the Ministry of Home Affairs in Congress-led UPA government.
Jyotiraditya Scindia's exit was among the triggers for a big churn in the party that led to 23 leaders writing to Sonia Gandhi asking for "visible and full-time" leadership and collective decision-making.
Scindia, Prasada, and Singh, all Doon school pals, were Rahul Gandhi aides and were in the Council of Ministers of the Manmohan Singh Congress led UPA governments.
As the media was abuzz with RPN switching over to BJP , Congress spokesperson Supriya Shrinath at a Press conference quoted Priyanka Gandhi as saying that the "battle which Congress party is fighting can be fought only with bravery" and "cowards can't fight it".