Yadav, Bhushan to meet on April 14 to decide next step

New Delhi, March 30

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With their future in the party hanging by a thread after the Aam Aadmi Party leadership expelled them from the party’s top echelon, Yogendra Yadav and Prashant Bhushan have convened a meeting on April 14 with their supporters amid speculation that they may a float a new political party.

Revealing only that supporters will meet on BR Ambedkar's birthday on April 14, Yadav said: “My opinion is that the spirit of the AAP movement has to be kept alive. We must march forward. We must not allow these incidents and negativity to affect us. We should move forward. The way to move forward would be to generate energy in the country."

He however, spoke no more of this meeting.

Already anticipating his expulsion, along with senior lawyer and party’s founder member Prashant Bhushan, Yadav said the AAP leadership would not hesitate to make the move. He, however, said he would not resign on his own.

"Going by what we have witnessed in the past one month, it will be the most natural consequence. I thought initially that sidelining us was enough for them. Then I thought may be they just want to throw us out of the Political Affairs Committee, then it was the National Executive. My own sense is that this whole farce is being played out in the true sprit of Stalinist purges and it will stop only after our expulsion from the party," Yadav said.

Yadav and Bhushan were expelled from the National Executive at a meeting of the National Council on Sunday, day after they were removed from party's Political Affairs Committee.

Yadav said his supporters and AAP’s well-wishers were deeply disturbed by the recent developments and want see a way to resolve the problem.

"The questions that Prashant and I raised are not individual questions. There is nothing personal about these questions. We would have posed the same questions to volunteers across the country whose voice we have raised and who have been calling to say that they support us. We would meet them and then decide what is to be done," said Yadav.

Asked if they are exploring legal recourse on Saturday’s meet, which both Yadav and Bhushan called illegal and unconstitutional, Yadav said he did not favour wasting time moving court over the issue.

Clarifying how things broke down, Yadav said that talks had already failed on March 24, but AAP leaders Ashish Khetan and Sanjay Singh wanted to give it some more time. Finally, seeing that talks were going nowhere, with Kejriwal’s supporters continuing to insist on the duo’s resignation from AAP’s National executive, Yadav said the duo called off negotiations.

"The entire negotiation had a starting point and an end point. The starting and end point was either you resign gracefully or we will throw you out," he said.

Yadav said Kejriwal continued to ignore the duos concerns over the party’s democratic process for the past one year.

He said Kejriwal loyalist Ashish Khaitan had come to him 10 days after the Delhi Elections to persuade him into quitting both Political Affairs Committee and National Executive.

"That day on, the message was repeated every single time."   

Yadav also slammed Kejriwal for removing internal Lokpal L Admiral L Ramdas

"The manner, the hurry in which Lokpal has been removed suggests a Stalinist purge. The manner in which the new disciplinary committee has been constituted, suggests this," said Yadav.

AAP is all right: Kejriwal

After a weekend of bitter infighting and drama in the Aam Admi Party, party chief Arvind Kerjriwal on Monday claimed that the party was “all right”.

Kejriwal, who was responding to a question on the upheaval in the party, said: “Party theek-thaak hai (The party is doing all right).”

The response comes a day after it dismissed senior party leader Prashant Bhushan from its disciplinary committee, which he was heading, by constituting a new three-member panel. All members of the new panel are known to be loyal to Kejriwal.

The party also terminated the services of the party’s internal Lokpal Admiral Ramdas and replaced him with another panel comprising two former IPS officers and one educationist.

Ramdas, in his report submitted last month, had signalled that all was not well within the party, pointing to a growing rift in the ranks and criticising the party top brass. Last week, Ramdas received a letter asking him to keep away from Saturday’s National Council meet to avoid “confrontation”. — PTI