Congress Suspends 2 Leaders For Serving Gulab Jamuns To BJP Minister at Plantation Drive in Indore

Indore: The Congress suspended Surjit Chadha, party President of Indore, and Sadashiv Yadav, party President of Indore Rural, for serving gulab jamuns to BJP Minister Kailash Vijayvargiya at the opposition party's office during a plantation drive event.

Vijayvargiya had gone to the local Congress office on July 12 to invite its leaders to join the sapling plantation drive organised here under the 'Ek Ped Maa Ke Naam' initiative, during which party functionaries were seen engaging in banter with the minister over tea and snacks.

Madhya Pradesh Congress Committee in a communiqué to Yadav last month in a reference to the BJP leader, stated, "A person who killed the democratic values in the state of Ma Ahilya and insulted Indore was accorded a warm welcome. Even the residents of Indore have criticised the leader."

The notice mentioned that welcoming such a person, who killed the democratic values in the city of Maa Ahilya and shamed the city in the country and abroad by snatching the right to vote from the people of Indore, in Gandhi Bhawan (the District Congress Committee office of Indore) came under the category of indiscipline.

The notice, dated July 20 and which came to light on Monday, sought an explanation from Chaddha and Yadav within seven days. It also said the duo would remain suspended from their posts during this period.

Mukesh Nayak, president of the media department of the MP Congress committee, confirmed to PTI that such a notice had been issued.

"The Congress organisation has not received a satisfactory reply to the notice from both the leaders and they are still suspended from their posts. Vijayvargiya made Akshay Kanti Bam, the declared candidate of the Congress from Indore Lok Sabha constituency, sit in his car and got his nomination withdrawn at the last moment," he said.

Chaddha and Yadav welcomed Vijayvargiya in the Indore office of the Congress and showed unnecessary courtesy to him, which is actually "dishonesty" with the party, Nayak added.

Bam had withdrawn his nomination on April 29, the last date for withdrawal, leaving the Congress out of the Indore Lok Sabha race for the first time in 72 years. Bam joined the BJP subsequently.

With the Congress not in the fray, sitting BJP MP Shankar Lalwani won by 11.75 lakh votes, the biggest victory nationwide in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls, the results of which were announced on June 4. Lalwani trounced Bahujan Samaj Party candidate Sanjay Solanki. (with PTI inputs)