As the rift within the AAP widens, top party leaders and known aides of AAP chief Arvind Kejriwal — Manish Sisodia, Gopal Rai, Pankaj Gupta and Sanjay Singh — on Tuesday accused fellow partymen Prashant Bhushan, Shanti Bhushan and Yogendra Yadav of conspiring to defeat the party before the Assembly election. In a joint statement, Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia, Cabinet Minister Gopal Rai, senior leader Sanjay Singh and party national secretary Pankaj Gupta clarified that their decision to remove Bhushan and Yadav from the Political Affairs Committee (PAC) came after gathering enough evidence against the duo.
This is first official attack on Yadav and the Bhushan family by the party so far. “The AAP won with heavy majority in the Assembly elections. But, while volunteers and party workers were working day and night to make AAP win, three of our top leaders were trying hard to make us lose,” the letter said, while listing examples of the same.
When asked why the party issued a public response, senior leader Sanjay Singh said, “After the National Executive meeting it was decided that nothing will be discussed publically. But, when Mayank Gandhi wrote in his blog and Yogendra Yadav and Prashant Bhushan started giving TV interviews the party’s image was getting ruined unnecessarily. There was confusion among volunteers. So we had to come out and tell the truth. We have long tried to keep this family together but now, when it’s all out in the open, people need to know the truth.”
Meanwhile, Yadav lashed out and accused the party leadership of planting evidence against them. He accused them of forcing Delhi MlAs to sign papers against him and Prashant Bhushan and said the country would know the “whole truth” very soon. As per sources, a letter is being circulated around for MlAs to sign which will be made public by the party in a day or two. The letter allegedly refers to the ouster of these three leaders namely Yogendra Yadav, Prashant and Shanti Bhushan. However, no confirmation on the same has come from the party.
According to the party’s top brass, Prashant Bhushan was calling up volunteers from other states and asking them not to come to Delhi to campaign. “He told volunteers, ‘Even I’m not campaigning in Delhi, so you shouldn’t either. It is important for the party to lose so that Arvind Kejriwal can be brought to his senses.’ This has been double checked by Anjali Damania (AAP’s leader in Maharashtra) who said that in front of her Prashant called up volunteers from Mysore and said this. He even stopped many people from donating to the party,” said the party leaders.
The leaders cited eight descriptive reasons as to why they were removed from the PAC in the national executive meeting last week. These reasons included the story allegedly planted by Yadav in The Hindu in August, 2015. The party also alleged that Yadav was talking to senior editors and giving information to malign the party’s image. The letter read, “Around two weeks before elections, when Ashish Khetan called Prashant Bhushan to ask him to come for the Delhi Dialogue on lokpal and Swaraj, Bhushan replied saying that leave alone campaigning for the party, he didn’t even want the party to win. He said that at the most, he didn’t want the party to get more that 20-22 seats in the Assembly. He said that only when the party will lose will the leadership change.”
The party added that Prashant Bhushan even threatened to hold press conferences to tarnish the party’s image. The letter even lashed out at their senior and founder leader Shanti Bhushan saying that the AAP leader not only spoke in favour of BJP’s chief ministerial candidate Kiran Bedi but also supported a breakaway faction AAP Volunteers Action Manch (AVAM). However, Prashant Bhushan and Yadav reacted to the letters saying that they welcomed AAP’s public statement as it began the possibility of open and transparent dialogue. “Truth shall prevail,” they said.