Mahesh Joshi's resignation a fallout of CLP meeting episode, claims Congress leader Randhawa

Congress Rajasthan in-charge Sukhjinder Singh Randhawa today said Mahesh Joshi's resignation from the chief whip's post was due to the CLP meeting episode of September 25. He said there will be further action in this connection. CM Ashok Gehlot had accepted Joshi's resignation yesterday.

Jaipur: Congress general secretary-in-charge Sukhjinder Singh Randhawa on Saturday attributed Mahesh Joshi's resignation from the post of party's chief whip in Assembly as a consequence of the high command's action in connection to the September 25 CLP meeting, which was suspended for selection of chief minister Ashok Gehlot's successor. He clarified that further action will be taken in this regard.

Randhawa said Joshi's resignation is due to both the party's one-man-one-post principle as well as a the high command's action on the contentious CLP meeting. He said further action will be taken by the high command in this matter. "As the matter took place before my appointment I will act as per the high command's directives," he said.

The Congress Rajasthan in-charge said he has not been asked to send any report on this issue but would initiate necessary proceedings if instructed by the high command. His statement has thus put an end to the ongoing speculations of Joshi's resignation being a fallout of the one-man-one-post principle. Earlier, Joshi held the dual posts of Cabinet minister and that of chief whip. He held the department of PHED.

Joshi had tendered his resignation prior to the Budget session and it was accepted by the chief minister on Friday. After putting down his papers, Joshi had told that in order to devote his entire time to the affairs of his department he wanted to be relieved of his responsibilities of chief whip.

Sources said that Joshi's involvement in the suspended CLP meeting that was scheduled five months back to select Gehlot's successor, did not go down well with the Congress high command. It served notices to Joshi and two other party leaders namely Shanti Dhariwal and Dharmendra Rathore for allegedly holding parallel CLP meetings.

Later, 81 MLAs resigned before the Speaker but later withdrew saying they were pressurised to do so. In this context, a section of the Congress leaders were dissatisfied at the party high command for not taking any disciplinary action against the three MLAs.

Responding to the alleged rift in the state Congress, Randhawa said he would try to address the discontentment among the leaders. He refuted deputy CM Sachin Pilot's reaction on alleged high command's inaction towards party MLAs indiscipline, terming those to be media's creation. "Pilot has not said any such thing. All these are created by the media," he said.

Pilot has recently spoken against the high command for not taking any action against the leaders who allegedly did not allow to hold the CLP meeting and forced the 81 MLAs to resign.