Former Congress leader Ghulam Nabi Azad, who recently resigned from the grand old party, said on Monday that he was “forced to leave his home.” To allegations of associating with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Azad said Modi is just “an excuse” and the party has had an issue with him since the G-23 letter was written.
“They never wanted anyone to write to them, to question them,” Azad told news agency ANI.
Azad, 73, a former chief minister of Jammu and Kashmir, ended his five-decade association with the Congress on Friday, terming it comprehensively destroyed and lashing out at Rahul Gandhi for demolishing its entire consultative mechanism.
Speaking to the media, he said that the Congress does not respect its leaders and “people don’t know about our contribution to the party”. While praising the Prime Minister, he said, “I had understood Modi was a crude man as he is not married, does not have children but he has shown his humane side when he spoke in Parliament about the incident that happened with the Gujarati tourists when I was the Chief Minister.”
In an exclusive interview with CNN-News18Azad on Sunday said he was starting his own party in Kashmir and was sure many more leaders from the Congress will join him. “Anyone who is self-respecting should. But let me tell you, I will never ever join or support the BJP,” he said.
Several leaders and activists, who resigned from the Congress following in Ghulam Nabi Azad’s footsteps, met under former Jammu and Kashmir minister G M Saroori’s leadership to ramp up support for the senior leader in his next endeavour.
Azad, a Congress veteran who resigned from the party on August 26, is scheduled to reach Jammu on September 4. He has announced floating a new party beginning with Jammu and Kashmir where assembly polls are due.
“Over 500 prominent Congress leaders and workers, including corporators, panchayat members and block-level leaders, have resigned from the party in support of Azad. The meeting was convened to send a message that we all are with Azad,” Saroori told PTI late on Sunday.
“In the coming days, you will see political stalwarts across the country strengthening the hands of Azad by becoming members of his party. Since Jammu and Kashmir is likely to go for assembly elections after the completion of a special summary revision of electoral rolls on November 25, the focus of Azad is here,” he said.
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