Announcing the decision of the national executive later, AAP’s senior leader Kumar Vishwas said both Yogendra Yadav and Prashant Bhushan would now be given new roles. “The party has decided to relieve them from the responsibility as members of the PAC. They will be assigned new role and responsibility,” Mr. Vishwas said.
Despite Mr. Kejriwal submitting his resignation, the second time in two weeks he has done so, the day had begun with talks of a possible resolution between the party’s two battling factions. When Mr. Yadav arrived at the venue, he told reporters that the conflict within the party was an ‘opportunity’ and that everything would be clear by evening.
AAP leader Ashish Khaitan, believed to be strongly in Mr. Kejriwal’s camp, had also taken down a tweet he had posted the previous day in which he had been sharply critical of the Bhushan family. According to sources within the party, members of Mr. Kejriwal’s camp first tried to get Mr. Bhushan and Mr. Yadav to resign from the PAC voluntarily, hoping to avoid the impression that they were being forced out. If they resigned voluntarily the solution was that Mr. Yadav would be made the state convenor of the AAP’s Maharashtra unit and Mr. Bhushan would head the party’s legal cell. Supporters of both leaders rejected the proposal and the two indicated that they wanted the national executive to vote on the issue.
Mr. Vishwas then tried to play mediator, taking Mr. Bhushan and Mr. Yadav into a separate room to try and reason with them. When this attempt failed, the national executive convened again in the early evening and a formal resolution was moved on whether the two should be removed from the PAC. Three members of the national executive were absent from the meeting and three abstained from voting.
