Barely a couple of days after he was expelled from Indian National Lok Dal (INLD), Ajay Chautala is on course to launch a new party under his leadership. He announced at a public meeting on Saturday that he would launch the same on December 9.
While addressing a rally of his supporters in Jind, Ajay never minced his words by saying that his brother Abhay is “Duryodhan”—the chief antagonist in the epic Mahabharat. “INLD Billu ko Mubarak. Who mera azeez hai (Billu, younger brother Ajay, is welcome to INLD. He is very dear to me),” he said while taking a swipe at his younger brother.
Dushyant, son of Ajay, who was also thrown out of the party, said that he “didn’t want to go back to the party that threw them out”.
In a bitter family feud, the INLD patriarch Om Prakash Chautala expelled three family members — son Ajay and grandsons Dushyant and Digvijay — for “indiscipline”. Ajay’s wife Naina Chautala, also a lawmaker, though challenged the INLD to expel her and also hinted at floating a new political outfit.
For quite some time, the family feud among the first family of the INLD has been a talking point but the bitterness reached climax when Chautala expelled two of his grandsons Dushyant and Digvijay on November 2. This was followed by the expulsion of son Ajay on Thursday.
Earlier, when the split within the party looked imminent, Dushyant had said that he learnt his expulsion from the party only through media. He also said that action can be taken against him only by the INLD’s national executive or a committee headed by the party president.
It was only after Ajay was sacked from the party, he had stated that the next course of action would be decided once he tours the entire Haryana.
However, Ajay is presently on parole and is serving a punishment in Tihar jail. Both OP Chautala and his son Ajay have been found guilty in JBT (junior basic teacher) scam in January 2013 and were awarded 10-year sentence by a CBI court in the capital.
If norms are anything to go by, both father-son duo are barred from contesting elections and the reins of the party went to the hands of OP Chautala’s younger son Abhay Singh Chautala since 2013.
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