Published 20:53 IST, September 10th 2019
Congress suffers another Maharashtra blow as Kripashankar Singh quits
Congress suffered another blow with Kripashankar Singh's resignation that causes more trouble to the party in the lead up to the Maharashtra assembly elections
In yet another blow to the Congress party before the upcoming State assembly elections, former Maharashtra minister Kripashankar Singh quit the Indian National Congress on Tuesday. Singh handed over his resignation to Maharashtra's Congress in-charge Mallikarjun Kharge in Delhi. Kripashankar Singh's resignation was the second blow to the Congress in a single day after actor-turned-politician Urmila Matondkar resigned earlier on the same day.
Future unknown
Kripashankar Singh is said to have resigned over the Congress' stand on Article 370 as he believed that the repeal of the article united the country and that every individual and party should support the move. The future or the next step of Singh is unknown. The move only deepens the Congress' issues and puts the Maharashtra arm of the party in deep crisis just as the Maharashtra Assembly polls are less than three months away. Singh was once the President of the Mumbai Congress and served as the Minister of State for Home in the Maharashtra Cabinet.
Congress continues to suffer
The Congress has been suffering from multiple exits in recent times and the problems for the party are only increasing as the infighting among the party members and the general complacency among the members have been increasing. The senior leaders from Maharashtra, Sanjay Nirupam and Milind Deora, have had problems for a long time and the same resurfaced on Saturday when Nirupam tweeted stating that removal of Deora as the President of the Mumbai Regional Congress Committee was an appropriate decision since he was unable to perform his duties and energise the cadres.
Moreover, the issues are not only limited to Maharashtra or any particular region but across the country and the party has been facing serious personnel issues. In Madhya Pradesh, CM Kamal Nath and Jyotiraditya Scindia have been fighting over the post of the state's Congress chief and have been summoned by Sonia Gandhi to solve the issue.
Earlier in the day, Matondkar resigned from the party citing 'petty politics' as the reason for her stepping down as a member. In a statement, she said, "I have resigned from the Indian National Congress. My political and social sensibilities refuse to allow vested interests in the party to use me as a mean to fight petty in-house politics instead of working on a bigger goal in
Mumbai Congress".
At the top of all, as the Maharashtra polls near, the country's oldest political party Congress has multiple issues to solve and has to even decide the President of the party after Rahul Gandhi resigned from the post on July 3.
Updated 23:41 IST, September 10th 2019