Arvinder Singh Lovely joins BJP, days after stepping down as Delhi Congress chief

Arvinder Singh Lovely

Days after stepping down from the post of Delhi Congress Chief, Arvinder Singh Lovely joined the Bharatiya Janata Party on May 4. Lovely joined the BJP at the party headquarters in Delhi in the presence of Union Minister Hardeep Singh Puri.

After joining BJP, Lovely said, “...Indira ji ne bola tha mere khoon ka katra katra iss desh ke liye hai. Aaj Congress party katre katre se tukde tukde tak pahunch gayi hain. That's why we've decided to join BJP which is working for the development of the country.”

“I had resigned from the post of Delhi Congress President and after that, I met all my colleagues and thousands of Congress workers. All those people said that you should not sit at home and should continue fighting for the people of Delhi and the country,” he added.

He had resigned from the position of Delhi Congress president on April 28 citing the party's alliance with the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) as one of the reasons.

He said the Delhi Congress unit was against the alliance but the party high command went ahead with it. In his resignation letter sent to Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge, Lovely had also said that he found himself "handicapped" as all unanimous decisions taken by senior Delhi unit leaders have been "unilaterally vetoed" by AICC Delhi in-charge Deepak Babria.

The letter read, "It is with a heavy heart that I write the present letter to you finding myself handicapped and unable to continue as the President of the Delhi party unit."

"I had gratefully accepted the role as the DPCC President with the sole objective of supporting the local Congress party workers with whom I have an extremely close connection and life-long association.

"However, since I cannot protect the interests of the party workers, I see no reason to continue in the said post. Therefore, with great regret and an extremely leaden heart, I, Arvinder Singh Lovely, do hereby tender my resignation from the post of DPCC President," he said.

A minister in the Sheila Dikshit government, Lovely was appointed as the Delhi Congress chief in August last year. He was first elected as an MLA in 1998 from Gandhi Nagar. He served as the minister of transport, education, urban development, and revenue in the Congress government in Delhi. The Congress had fielded Lovely against BJP's Gautam Gambhir and AAP's Atishi from the East Delhi constituency in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections.

The development comes amid the ongoing Lok Sabha polls as the BJP hopes to reinstate Narendra Modi as the prime minister for a third term.