Infighting in AAP started quite some time back: source

New Delhi: After an intense letter battle between two top leaders of the Aam Aadmi Party, Arvind Kejriwal has taken to Twitter to do some damage control. But if sources are to be believed, the ugly spat between Manish Sisodia and Yogendra Yadav has been on the cards for quite some time now. [caption id=“attachment_1560351” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  AAP leader Yogendra Yadav. PTI[/caption] While Yadav had earlier told Firstpost, that AAP ‘is a common platform for like-minded people’, there exists an ideological divide. While leaders like Yadav and Prashant Bhushan come from a left oriented socialist background, there are others who represent a more right wing approach such as Sisodia and Kumar Viswas. Even though sources say that Arvind Kejriwal as the party leader has his support for Sisodia, until recently no open criticism of Kejriwal has been received from the top brass. Yadav’s recent letter to the PAC (political affairs committee) is probably the first instance where one of the party’s top leaders has raised questions over the internal democracy of the party. The attrition from the Aam Aadmi Party following its resignation from the Delhi government and a tumultuous 49 days in the cabinet of Delhi has been constant. The latest addition being one of the top face of the party in Delhi, Shazia Ilmi. However, most people who have quit the party earlier, apart from long time members Ashok Agarwal and Madhu Bhaduri, have taken to mud slinging against the party before the Lok Sabha elections. So much so that renowned right wing activists and RSS sympathisers who in press conferences claimed to be founding members of the party, maligned it later. However, Yadav’s recent letter is far away from such motivated criticism, claim insiders. “He (Yadav) definitely understands politics better than some members of the party who do not have a political background whatsoever,” says a national executive member on condition of anonymity. The rift between Sisodia and Yadav, according to a PAC member started a while ago. The PAC member told Firstpost that on two important occasions Kejriwal and Sisodia took decisions unilaterally fuelling a rift within the party. “During the time when then chief minister (Arvind Kejriwal) sat on a dharna in front of the railway ministry and later on when AAP decided to resign from power, all the members of the PAC were present in Delhi but no one was consulted,” said another PAC member Ilias Azmi. “The big decisions were basically being taken by a couple of people,” said Azmi. Yadav’s letter to the PAC reaffirms these claims. Yadav, in his letter, raises the point that in major decisions, the national executive body was being overlooked. The same sources have mentioned that the fallout between Sisodia and Yadav started taking place way back in 2013. “On a couple of occasion Yadav was humiliated in front of other members of the party,” said a source in the party.