New-Delhi: In a big setback for the Congress, Senior Veteran leader Ghulam Nabi Azad on Friday resigned from all the positions including primary membership of the party.
Azad joined the Congress in the mid 1970s and has held many important positions both in the party and the government.
He was a minister in the central cabinet headed by Indira Gandhi, Rajiv Gandhi, P.V. Narasimha Rao and Dr. Manmohan Singh.
Since 1980, Azad was the general secretary of AICC under every party president during that period.
He was the chief minister of J&K from 2005 to 2008.
In a letter written to Congress interim president Sonia Gandhi, Azad wrote: “It is therefore with great regret and an extremely leaden heart that I have decided to sever my half a century old association with Indian National Congress.”
“You are aware that I had an extremely close personal relationship with your family from Late Mrs. Indira Gandhi, Late Shri Sanjay Gandhi onwards, including with your Late husband. In that spirit I also have great personal regard for your individual trials and tribulations which would always continue.”
“Some of my other colleagues and I will now persevere to perpetuate the ideals for which we have dedicated our entire adult lives outside the formal fold of the Indian National Congress,” he added
He said for all the reasons mentioned above, “especially that the Indian National Congress has lost both the will and the ability under the tutelage of the coterie that runs the AICC to fight for what is right for India.”
“In fact, before starting Bharat Jodo Yatra the leadership should have undertaken a Congress Jodo exercise across the country. It is therefore with great regret and an extremely leaden heart that I have decided to sever my half a century old association with the Indian National Congress and hereby resign from all my positions including the primary membership of the Indian National Congress,” he wrote in the letter
Azad’s resignation comes after he declined the post of party’s campaign chief in Jammu and Kashmir.
Ms Kalinga