AAP loses Jat face with Kailash Gahlot’s exit

New Delhi: The Aam Aadmi Party on Sunday lost its popular Jat face and key minister in Delhi, Kailash Gahlot, whose resignation is likely to hit the AAP government’s ambitious plan to roll out the scheme of Rs 1,000 monthly honorarium to women ahead of Assembly polls due in February.

Gahlot represented the Jat-dominated Najafgarh constituency in West Delhi since 2015. The ripples of his resignation are sure to be felt in the rural belt of outer Delhi areas that have a significant presence of the community, AAP sources said.

The 50-year-old held portfolios of Transport, Home, IT, Administrative Reforms, and Women and Child Development in the Atishi government.

The Women and Child Development department has been drafting ‘Mukhyamantri Mahila Samman Yojna’, announced by Chief Minister Atishi in the budget 2024-25. Its planned implementation before the polls to woo voters will now be affected as Gahlot was closely associated with the drafting of the scheme, officials said.

In his resignation letter to AAP convener Arvind Kejriwal, Gahlot raised several issues including the “Sheeshmahal” controversy over his former official residence, the Delhi government’s tussle with the Centre disrupting the delivery of basic services to people and the failure to clean Yamuna River, virtually echoing the BJP’s views.

Last year, he was divested of important portfolios of Revenue and Finance that were handed over to Atishi. Further, he was overlooked by Kejriwal, who was in jail, when he decided to nominate a minister to unfurl the tricolour on the chief minister’s behalf on Independence Day this year.

Gahlot finally unfurled the national flag at the Delhi government function after the Lt Governor decided in his favour, although Kejriwal wanted Atishi to do so, the sources said.

Again, Gahlot was bypassed by Kejriwal who chose Atishi as his successor following his decision to step down as chief minister. This apparently rubbed Gahlot the wrong way, they claimed.

Gahlot, who shared his letters of resignation to Delhi Chief Minister Atishi and AAP convener Kejriwal from the council of ministers and the primary membership of the party, respectively, did not respond to calls and messages.

Kejriwal too refused to comment on his resignation, when questioned by reporters at a party programme.

The sources said Gahlot enjoyed cordial relations with bureaucrats of the Delhi government as well as the office of Delhi L-G VK Saxena. Even at the peak of the tussle between the AAP dispensation and the L-G, Gahlot never used harsh words, they said.

Gahlot faced action in the past by central agencies as the income tax department raided several premises including his Vasant Kunj residence in 2018, and his name cropped up in an ED remand application over an excise policy accused living at the official accommodation provided to the Delhi minister.

In 2022, the Central Bureau of Investigation filed a case into alleged irregularities related to the procurement of 1000 low-floor buses by the DTC.

He was a lawyer by profession and joined the Aam Aadmi Party in 2015.