More dissent in AAP? Shazia Ilmi refuses to contest from Rae Bareli against Sonia Gandhi

NEW DELHI: Has dissension in the Aam Aadmi Party, so far confined to workers and assorted secondlevel leaders, reached its top echelons?

Founding member Shazia Ilmi’s unwillingness to fight Congress president Sonia Gandhi from Rae Bareli, on her party’s request, sparked off this speculation on Tuesday, even as the AAP leaders h i p worke d overtime to deny any rift within the party. According to people close to Ilmi, the journalist-turned-politician is, indeed, upset with her colleagues in AAP’s political advisory committee over ticket distribution for Lok Sabha elections.

“She wanted to contest from one of the seven seats in Delhi, but finally the party chose other people, who are essentially outsiders, over her,” said a close aide on the condition of anonymity, referring to former journalists Ashish Khetan and Ashutosh, who were recently fielded as candidates from New Delhi and Chandni Chowk seats, respectively.

“They want her to fight Sonia Gandhi, but she is not keen on it.” The speculation stemmed from Ilmi’s tweet on Monday night. “I am not contesting from Rae Bareli. I never agreed to nor do I now ... I’ve been denying this for the last two months,” she wrote on social networking site Twitter.

But speaking to ET, she categorically denied being upset over ticket allocation. “It’s an innocent tweet and I don’t see why it should be seen like I am at war with people,” she said. The party, too, chose to play down her tweet. “It’s her decision if she doesn’t want to contest (from Rae Bareli),” said AAP leader Sanjay Singh.

The hue and cry over Tuesday’s incident is the latest in the string of controversies that has hit the party recently. ET had first reported the growing dissent within the AAP, which witnessed a spurt of protests by volunteers upset over outsiders being asked to contest central elections on the party’s behalf and inaccessibility of top leaders.

Member of AAP’s National Executive Ashok Agarwal quit the party this week, saying that it has become “directionless” and was functioning like a “private limited company”. Earlier Ashwini Upadhyay, member of the party’s national council, quit the outfit for similar reasons.

For party ideologue Yogendra Yadav, such incidents are inevitable. “No political party can escape this phenomenon of protests and dissent when the number of seats exceeds the number of aspirants. We are a young party and because we are politically inexperienced, our volunteers can’t seem to distinguish between candidates suitable to become a sarpanch (village head), MLA and MP,” he said. “But yes, we need to have a consultative mechanism to identify any disagreement within the party before it comes out in the open."