Milind Deora latest among young Congress leaders to quit party after Jyotiraditya Scindia, Jitin Prasada, Priyanka Chaturvedi, Hardik Patel, Sunil Jakhar

Development reflects a continuing saga of unaddressed concerns of young leaders once considered close to former Congress president Rahul Gandhi

Milind Deora. PTI file

PTI

New Delhi, January 14

Former Union minister and ex-MP from Mumbai South Milind Deora’s resignation from the Congress on Sunday is the latest addition to a list of young leaders who have left it to begin new innings in other parties, predominantly the BJP.

The development reflects a continuing saga of unaddressed concerns of young leaders once considered close to former Congress president Rahul Gandhi.

Every such exit has also highlighted the alleged inaccessibility of the Gandhi family to the lower rung of party leadership and the reluctance to pass on the baton to the next generation amid the dwindling fortunes of the grand old party that the young leaders are unable to accept.

Sources close to Deora said he left the party after “a very long and futile wait”.

The former Lok Sabha MP could not manage an assurance from his party that he would get to contest from Mumbai South in the upcoming general election, a seat represented by his family for decades, the sources said.

Lack of redressal of festering issues and intra-party factionalism earlier led several promising leaders of the Rahul Gandhi camp to leave.

The list is long with former Rajasthan deputy chief minister Sachin Pilot standing out as the sole exception as he chose to stay despite non-fulfilment of promises made to him by the top brass when he called off his revolt in 2020 against his bete noire Ashok Gehlot, then CM.

“Everyone is free to choose their party and ideology, only time will tell whether his decision was right or not,” Pilot said on Sunday Deora’s exit from the party.

Union minister in the Congress-led UPA government Jyotiraditya Scindia was not so patient with factionalism in the Madhya Pradesh unit when he resigned from the Congress to join the BJP in March 2020. Scindia said he could no longer take the disrespect coming from veteran Kamal Nath.

In June 2021, another ex-UPA minister Jitin Prasada quit the Congress citing the party’s growing disconnect with the people.

A series of exodus happened thereafter with Priyanka Chaturvedi joining the erstwhile undivided Shiv Sena, former Gujarat unit working president Hardik Patel joining the BJP, former Mahila Congress chief Sushmita Dev quitting for TMC while former union minister RPN Singh, former Punjab Congress chief Sunil Jakhar and party spokesperson Jaiveer Shergill also joined the BJP.

The exits that began with then Assam Congress stalwart Himanta Biswa Sarma leaving the party for the BJP on the eve of the 2014 Lok Sabha polls never really stopped and high-profile resignations continued with even former Punjab CM Amarinder Singh also going to the BJP citing personal insults by the party ahead of Punjab polls in 2022.

“It is impossible to get an audience with Rahul Gandhi, there is a clear disconnect and one feels suffocated,” a Deora aide said explaining his decision.

Similar views were earlier aired by most leaders, including Sarma, at the time of their exit.

Rahul Gandhi personally has long held a view that those who wish to quit are free to do so.

The Congress leadership has so far chosen to explain the exits as resignations of leaders who don’t have the capacity to take on the BJP in an ideological fight.

“Once the tide turns in our favour all these leaders will return. For them it’s individual above the party,” he said.