Actress-turned-politician Urmila Matondkar quit the Congress on Tuesday afternoon barely six months after joining the party. She blamed petty in-house politics and held the party leadership responsible for not putting in reasonable efforts to put its house in order.
Matondkar, who fought the Lok Sabha election from Mumbai North constituency, said that she was feeling betrayed by the Congress leadership. “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,” she said
In July, Matondkar’s letter to then Mumbai Congress chief Milind Deora had surfaced where she made scathing comments against trusted aides of her senior colleague Sanjay Nirupam.
Matondkar said that the leaders whom she had held responsible for her defeat in her letter to Deora were given new responsibilities. She also pointed out that her letter, sent on May 16 and meant for Deora, was “leaked”. Milind Deora has resigned as the Mumbai Congress unit chief. He has been replaced by Eknath Gaikwad.
Matondkar has however said that she will stick to her thoughts and ideologues hinting that she might not join any other political party. She had recently visted the flood-affected Kolhapur and Sangli regions of Maharashtra.
Nirupam had hit out at Deora after Matondkar’s letter became public. “Young leader who desires to stabilise party at national level has released copies of complaint letter of an LS candidate to media houses to publish it. It was addressed to him against party workers after election. Is this the way he is going to adopt to stabilise the party,” Nirupam had tweeted.
Deora had hit back saying that a party and its ideals are bigger than one individual. “Some unpleasant and unwarranted commentary from certain quarters should be ignored and not countered. The Congress party has seen many upheavals and shall overcome this one too,” he had said in a statement.
Deora, a former Union minister, had replaced Nirupam as the Mumbai Congress chief ahead of the Lok Sabha polls in April-May. Both had unsuccessfully contested the Lok Sabha elections from South Mumbai and Mumbai North West respectively.
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