Brar effect: More leave Congress

JALANDHAR: As 15 Congress leaders, including two ex-MLAs and 6 current and former members of Punjab Pradesh Congress Committee, who are loyalists of former MP Jagmeet Singh Brar, resigned from primary membership of the party on Wednesday, they have not ruled out joining BJP even as they said further decision was yet to be taken.
Those who announced their resignations here on Wednesday also included Brar’s younger brother and former Kotkapura MLA Ripjeet Singh Brar, former Moga MLA Vijay Kumar Sathi, former chief of Muktsar district Congress committee Gurdas Girdhar and former All India Congress Committee member Manjeet Singh Jalbuti.
They criticized Congress for ignoring its leaders and alleged that only money or familial ties were deciding the fate of party leaders. While leaving Congress, they ruled out any possibility of joining SAD (Badal) or making a new party. After repeated queries on joining BJP, the outgoing Congress leaders said they did not rule it out but any decision was yet to be taken by Jagmeet Brar who had already started the process of consulting his supporters and workers across Punjab.
They claimed that people were fed up with Congress and SAD and wanted a third alternative.
“Tickets are being sold out in Congress. We are leaving the party with a heavy heart after seeing no possibility of improvement in its working and culture. Anyone can become a PPCC secretary after paying money to the leaders who are controlling it,” they alleged.
These leaders praised Prime Minister Narendra Modi for his working and initiatives but avoided saying that they would join BJP.
Sathi alleged that during Moga by-election in 2013 in which he was the Congress candidate, Akali leaders came from Majha region to make their cells of drug supplies in 52 villages of the constituency and those villages were badly afflicted by drug menace. He also alleged that it was PPCC president Partap Singh Bajwa who stayed in the constituency for four days, but internally worked towards his defeat.