AAP's Prashant Bhushan & Yogendra Yadav stripped off all key posts in chaotic national council meeting

The purge, a political tool belonging more to the communist parties, took effect in the Aam Aadmi Party ( AAP) on Saturday with dissenting leaders evicted from key posts and the Arvind Kejriwal loyalists proclaiming the party to be their own. Prashant Bhushan, Yogendra Yadav, Anand Kumar and Ajit Jha were stripped off all influential posts in a chaotic meeting at a private resort in the outskirts of Delhi, a process many believe will culminate in their removal from the party altogether.

High drama ensued at the premises of a sprawling resort called 'Calista' where the AAP national council meeting took place. AAP volunteers swearing allegiance to Kejriwal had taken positions early on, and Yadav was heckled as he reached the venue. As they walked out angrily from the meeting and into the crowd, Yadav, Bhushan, Kumar and party Lok Sabha MP Dharamveer Gandhi claimed the other faction had employed bouncers to muscle their way into the meeting.

By afternoon, AAP leaders Pankaj Gupta, Sanjay Singh and Manish Sisodia walked out of tall black entry gates to announce the sentence: out of 311 NC members who had attended the meeting, 247 voted in favour of a resolution to remove the four leaders from NC, eight against, two wrote dissent notes and 54 either abstained or walked off in opposition from a secluded hall inside the resort owned by party MLA Naresh Yadav.

Yadav said many members were prevented from attending the meeting. Some Bihar and UP NC members including Rahul Kumar and Vikas Pandey alleged that the entire process was "fixed". "Kejriwal left the venue soon after giving a speech and then, Sisodia brought in a resolution to remove Bhushan and Yadav from NC. He declared that since 167 people had already signed it, it was passed. We protested but were shouted down by MLAs and others so walked away. Later we understood voting was conducted. How is this genuine?" asked Pandey.

Sanjay Singh, a Kejriwal confidante, rubbished all the charges. "There was no physical assault on anyone. These are false claims. How is it that eight NC members managed to vote," asked Singh.