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'Don't Waste Time, Join Like-minded Party': AAP Invites Hardik Patel

Hardik Patel, who spearheaded the Patidar community campaign in Gujarat, had joined the Congress party in 2019.

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After speculations that Gujarat Congress leader Hardik Patel could leave the party, the Patidar leader now has received a new offer. Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) Gujarat chief Gopal Italia on Friday, 15 April, invited him to join the "like-minded party."

"If Hardik Patel is not liking Congress, he should join a like-minded party like AAP. Instead of complaining to Congress, wasting his time, he should contribute here... A party like Congress would not have a place for dedicated people like him," Italia was quoted saying by ANI.

The Congress leader had earlier dismissed rumours about him leaving the party.

Patel, who spearheaded the Patidar community campaign in Gujarat and sought reservations under the Other Backward Class (OBC) category, had joined the Congress in 2019.

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At an event in Gujarat's Surat on Thursday, 14 April, he said, "There is a rumour that I am leaving Congress, I don't know who is spreading it."

"I have given my 100 percent to Congress till now, and will give the same in the coming days. There will be small fights and blame games within the party, but we have to work together to make Gujarat a better place," he said, according to ANI.

"If speaking truth is a crime, consider me guilty. The people of Gujarat have expectations from us, we have to stand up to them," the Congress leader added.

On Wednesday, 13 April, Patel had hit out at the Congress Party saying he had been sidelined and the party leadership was not willing to utilise his skills. The comments came a day after he indicated his willingness to contest the elections after the Supreme Court stayed his conviction in the Mehsana rioting case.

"I am not invited to any of the meetings of the PCC, they don't consult me before taking any decisions; then what is the point of this post?" he had said.

"My position in the party is that of a newly married groom who has been made to undergo nasbandi (vasectomy)," he told The Indian Express.

He also questioned the delay in inducting popular Patidar leader Naresh Patel in Congress.

Patel alleged that when the Congress announced the appointment of 75 new general secretaries and 25 new vice-presidents, he wasn't consulted.

Patel, who became working president of Gujarat in 2020, said the quota agitation had helped Congress win a major number of seats in 2015 during the elections to local bodies and also in the 2017 Assembly polls when the Opposition party had won 77 seat in the 182-member House.

(With inputs from ANI and Indian Express.)

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