Senior RLD leader quits party over alliance with BJP: ‘To remain silent would be a sin’

Hours after Jayant Chaudhary shared the stage with Prime Minister Narendra Modi at a rally on Sunday, the Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) chief was left embarrassed after its national vice-president Shahid Siddiqui resigned citing the BJP’s “concerted attacks on democratic institutions and the Constitution”.

“This is the last straw. In these circumstances, it is not in the interest of the country, society and people that I remain with the NDA. For someone who opposed the Emergency, this is not acceptable and to remain silent would be a sin,” Siddiqui told The Indian Express on Monday.

Siddiqui, who had joined the RLD in 2016, is the first senior party leader to quit following its entry into the NDA last month. In his resignation letter addressed to Chaudhary, Siddiqui said he had respect for the RLD chief with whom he had worked for the past six years.

“From the time of your grandfather Bharat Ratna Chaudhary Charan Singhji, your father Ajit Singhji and yourself, the party has stood for these (democratic) values. However, the RLD becoming a part of the NDA puts me in a bind and a piquant situation. I have struggled long and hard in my mind and heart but find myself unable to be associated with an alliance headed by the BJP,” he wrote.

Siddiqui said he quit the party only on Sunday despite the alliance with the BJP being formally announced weeks ago as he did not want to be seen as opposing the Bharat Ratna to Chaudhary Charan Singh, which the Centre announced last month. “The attack on elected CMs and Opposition parties when elections have been announced is an attack on democracy and the great institutions that we have built,” he said.

Terming the RLD chief his younger brother, with whom he had floated the Samajik Ekta Manch