NEW DELHI: Ghulam Nabi Azad has scheduled his maiden rally in Jammu after quitting the Congress on September 4, the same day Rahul Gandhi has slated a 'Mehngai par Halla Bol' event in the national capital.
With the timing of Azad's launch event in Jammu and Kashmir coinciding with Gandhi's rally, it will be seen if there are more fireworks on the day the former Congress chief addresses the mega event at Delhi's Ramlila Maidan.
Azad has said that his resignation letter was just a "tip of the iceberg", indicating that he would step up his attack on the Gandhis in the coming days.
He has already stated that he would float his own outfit in Jammu and Kashmir soon, where assembly elections are due to be announced.
Ahead of Azad's Sunday rally in Jammu's Sainik farms, there has been a spate of resignations in the Jammu and Kashmir Congress.
Sixty-four more leaders, including former deputy chief minister Tara Chand, tendered their resignation and joined the Ghulam Nabi Azad camp on Tuesday, leaving the unit of the national party in the Union Territory in tatters.
The former chief minister of Jammu and Kashmir had targeted Rahul Gandhi in his five-page resignation letter to Sonia Gandhi last Friday.
Azad had launched a stinging attack on Rahul Gandhi describing him as "immature" and "childish" and accusing the leadership of "foisting a non-serious individual" at the helm of the party.
Azad mentioned Rahul Gandhi seven times, accusing him of running the party through a "new coterie of inexperienced sycophants".
Azad, 73, who has been associated with the Congress for nearly five decades, also attacked party chief Sonia Gandhi for applying the "remote control model that demolished the institutional integrity of the UPA government" to the party.
He also reminded Sonia Gandhi that she was just a "nominal figurehead" and all the important decisions were being taken by Rahul or "rather worse his security guards and PAs".
Azad slammed Rahul Gandhi's conduct within the party and singled out his action of tearing up a government ordinance in "full glare" of the media.
"One of the most glaring examples of this immaturity was the tearing up of a government ordinance in the full glare of the media by Shri Rahul Gandhi," he said.
"The said ordinance was incubated in the Congress Core Group and subsequently unanimously approved by the Union Cabinet presided over by the Prime Minister of India and duly approved even by the President of India.
"This 'childish' behaviour completely subverted the authority of the Prime Minister and Government of India," said Azad, who served as Health Minister in the UPA-II government.
The spate of resignations in the Jammu and Kashmir Congress continued unabated with 64 more leaders including a former deputy chief minister tendering their resignation and joining the Ghulam Nabi Azad camp on Tuesday, leaving the unit of the national party in the Union Territory in tatters.
Led by former deputy chief minister Tara Chand, the leaders in their joint resignation letter to Congress president Sonia Gandhi said "all of us had a very long association with the party spanning over decades. But unfortunately we found that the treatment meted out to us was humiliating."
Putting up a brave face, Jammu and Kashmir Pradesh Congress Committee president Vikar Rasool Wani, once a close ally of Azad, lashed out at the defectors and said only cowards run away during difficult times.
"Those who are loyal to Azad will leave the party but there are thousands who are loyal to congress and they will stay in the party. Leaving of some people will not matter much to the party and their departure will not be any major loss to the Congress," Wani said.
Azad, 73, former chief minister of Jammu and Kashmir, ended his five-decade association with the Congress on Friday, terming the party "comprehensively destroyed" and lashing out at Rahul Gandhi for "demolishing" its entire consultative mechanism.
Since his resignation, a number of prominent leaders have joined Azad, including a former member of parliament, a deputy chief minister, 15 former legislators including seven former ministers, besides a large number of Panchayati Raj Institution (PRI) members, municipal corporators and grass-root level workers from across Jammu and Kashmir.
Chand, along with others including former ministers Abdul Majid Wani, Manohar Lal Sharma, Gharu Ram and former MLA Balwan Singh, announced their resignations from the Congress at a press conference here on Tuesday.
"Owing to the circumstances and the leadership crisis in Congress party, where a coterie surrounding party high command is calling shots in the most irresponsible manner and ruining the party.
"All of us had a very long association with the party spanning over decades and devoted all our energy and resources towards expanding the party in Jammu and Kashmir but unfortunately we found that the treatment meted out to us was humiliating," Balwan Singh said, reading out from the joint resignation letter signed by 64 Congress men and senior functionaries from across the Jammu province.
The letter further said "with our leader and mentor Ghulam Nabi Azad having resigned from the party on the issue listed by him in a letter to you (Sonia Gandhi), we believe that we should also come out of Congress to make some worthwhile contribution in building a positive political society where people are heard and responded too."
Azad will soon launch a national-level party from Jammu and Kashmir.
Claiming that Jammu and Kashmir is facing an unprecedented crisis in the absence of an elected government, Balwan Singh said Azad's decision to launch a national-level party from here will inspires hope and new determination to set things right once and for all.
"We are confident that J-K will be able to get statehood back after a gap of three years under the leadership of Azad. He is the sole and most powerful voice for the statehood of J-K and early elections," he said.
Wani played down the chain of resignations in the party and said "cowards" run away during difficult times as the J-K Congress held a show of strength rally in the city.
He said the new leadership will strive hard to make the Congress "number one" party in the Union territory.
Wani, the newly appointed JKPCC chief, arrived here, with party leaders and workers lining up on both sides of the road to welcome him.
He was accompanied by AICC in-charge for J-K and MP Rajani Patil.
"We will fight the BJP as well as those selfish people who have left the party. We will make the party number one in Jammu and Kashmir," Wani told reporters.
Dubbing those who left the Congress as "loyalists of Azad", he said only cowards run away during difficult times.
"Those who are loyal to Azad will leave the party but there are thousands who are loyal to congress and they will stay in the party," he said.
Wani said the leaving of some people will not matter much to the party.
The JKPCC chief was received by working president Raman Bhalla and former minister Yogesh Sawhney amid pro-Congress and Pro-Rahul Gandhi slogans.
The Congress cavalcade of vehicles and motorcycles then moved into the city.
Amid drum beating, Congress workers lined up on two sides of the road and showered flowers upon the newly announced leadership of the J-K Congress.
"Those interested to leave the party and want to go with Azad can leave. The party only wants loyalists who stand with the ideology of the party and its leadership," Bhalla said.
Pointing towards the huge number of Congress activists, he said, "This is the proof of loyalty. We don't want disloyal and selfish people who after enjoying power for years leave the party in its difficult times."
Retired IAS officer and veteran Kashmiri Pandit leader Vinod Kaul also resigned from the Congress in support of Azad and said he will fully support the new initiative of the veteran leader in Jammu and Kashmir.
Kaul had joined the Congress in Jammu on March 29, 2019.