Zee Media Bureau, New Delhi :
In what could spell more trouble for the Aam Aadmi Party whose chief is in jail, one of its founding members, Shazia Ilmi, and another leader, Captain Gopinath, quit on Saturday.
While announcing her resignation, Ilmi told reporters yesterday that there was a lack of democracy within the party.
“There is lack of inner party democracy within the Aam Aadmi Party. The party which talks about ‘Swaraj’ has failed to apply it within the party,” Ilmi said at a press conference here.
Accusing the party of marginalising her, Ilmi said: “We fight against cronyism but there is a crony clique that runs AAP, who takes the decisions and we are told about it later.”
She also clarified that her resignation from the party is not due to the fact that she was asked to contest the Lok Sabha election from Ghaziabad, from where she lost. She also said the party has lost its direction and needs to introspect and go beyond agitations.
“I am not for jail bharo politics. There is a need to reinvent the AAP, go beyond agitation,” Ilmi said while taking a potshot at AAP chief Arvind Kejriwal, who is in judicial custody for refusing to pay bail amount in a defamation case. The journalist-turned-politician, who contested Lok Sabha elections from Ghaziabad constituency, even lost her security deposit as she could get just 89,125 votes.
Meanwhile, GR Gopinath, the pioneer of low-cost air travel in India, also quit Aam Admi Party, which is reeling under Lok Sabha poll debacle, citing growing differences with the leadership and its ways and criticised Arvind Kejriwal’s recent actions.
Gopinath, who joined AAP in January this year, stressed that he was a great admirer of Anna Hazare and Kejriwal and continues to be so but disagreed with some of the decisions of of the AAP chief saying a head of a party cannot indulge in “shoot and scoot politics”.
In a communication to AAP’s Karnataka Convenor Prithvi Reddy, he said, “I would like to resign from the membership of the Aam Admi Party with immediate effect because of increasing differences with the party leadership and its ways.”
Gopinath said he had “expressed most of my views also in the media including today” and wished “the party well in its future endeavours”.
When contacted, Gopinath confirmed the development over phone from Toulouse in France where the headquarters of aircraft manufacturing major, Airbus, is located.
He disagreed with Kejriwal on his refusal to furnish a bail bond in the defamation case filed against him by BJP leader Nitin Gadkari.
Gopinath said it could not be compared to the stand taken by Hazare, who was sent to judicial custody in August 2011 following his arrest during Janlokpal Bill agitation after he refused to sign a personal bond.
Gopinath had founded the first low-cost carrier Air Deccan in 2003, which was taken over by Vijay Mallya and named ‘Kingfisher Red’ that has now closed down.
