National Desk, 4th April: Gourav Vallabh, the former national spokesperson of Congress, made headlines on Thursday by joining the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) mere hours after announcing his resignation from Congress, which he criticized as ‘directionless’.
Accompanied by Anil Sharma, the former president of Congress in Bihar, Vallabh officially shifted his allegiance to the BJP in Delhi, in a ceremony attended by Vinod Tawde, the national general secretary of the party.
In his resignation letter addressed to Congress chief Mallikarjun Kharge, Vallabh cited his discomfort with the direction of the Congress party. He expressed his unwillingness to propagate ‘anti-Sanatana’ slogans or criticize the country’s wealth creators. Vallabh, known for his influential role in economic discussions, played a crucial part in Kharge’s campaign for the Congress presidency.
Vallabh’s political journey saw him contesting in the 2023 Rajasthan assembly elections from the Udaipur constituency, where he faced defeat against the BJP candidate by a margin of over 32,000 votes. His political career commenced in 2019 in Jharkhand’s Jamshedpur East, where he secured over 18,000 votes, finishing third behind then-Chief Minister Raghubar Das and Saryu Roy.
Vallabh’s decision to join the BJP underscores the evolving political dynamics and highlights the challenges faced by the Congress party in retaining its members amidst internal dissent and ideological differences.