Who is Arvinder Singh Lovely? Why did he quit as Delhi Congress chief?

In a major setback to the Congress amid the ongoing Lok Sabha elections, Arvinder Singh Lovely resigned as the chief of the party's Delhi unit on Sunday over its alliance with the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP).

The disgruntled Congress leader said several AAP ministers have been jailed over corruption charges, but the Congress forged an alliance with Arvind Kejriwal's party for the Lok Sabha elections amid opposition by the party workers.

However, Lovely made it clear that he has only resigned as chief of the Congress' Delhi unit and is not joining any other political party. His clarification came after Congress ex-MLA Asif Mohammad Khan claimed that the BJP would field Lovely from the East Delhi constituency, replacing Harsh Malhotra.

“I have only resigned as Delhi Congress chief and I am not joining any political party,” he said at a press conference at his residence.

Why he quit

Putting in his papers, Lovely slammed the Congress’ Delhi in-charge Deepak Babaria for not letting him function while also flaying the party's alliance with AAP and its decision to field Kanhaiya Kumar and Udit Raj from North East Delhi and North West Delhi constituencies, respectively.

Lovely said their views were sought and he had put them forth but the final decision of naming these “outsiders” as candidates was not discussed with him and he got to know about it only when the list was out. He said there was resentment in the party ranks over the candidates and he tried to resolve matters. However, he was compelled to resign after Kanhaiya and Udit Raj made statements that were “directly contradictory to the party line”.

He said, “My resignation is not over ticket distribution but no Congress worker will accept the statements these candidates have made applauding AAP for everything and undermining what the Sheila Dikshit government achieved”. He reiterated his charges against Kanhaiya Kumar, the Congress candidate from North East Delhi. “I have served as the education minister in Sheila Dikshit's government. Can our candidate undermine what Sheila Dikshit's government did for Delhi in education sector?”

The former minister said he will meet with party workers soon to discuss and explain his position. He clarified, “I have only resigned as Delhi Congress president not as member of the Congress party. I resigned in keeping with my beliefs and to raise issues that are in the interest of the party. I’m not joining any other party. I have raised all issues in my letter to the Congress president and I don't want to go into further details right now.”

Political career

Considered as one of the prominent faces in the Delhi Congress unit, Lovely started his political career at a young age. He became the youngest MLA when he was first elected to the Delhi Assembly from Gandhi Nagar constituency at the age of 30 in 1998. He went on to represent the constituency for the next 17 years, as he got elected in 2003, 2008 and 2013.

In the successive Delhi governments led by Sheila Dixit, Lovely held several important portfolios, such as urban development and Revenue ministry, education, and transport.

A former president of the Delhi Pradesh Congress Committee, Lovely was pitted against cricketer-turned-politician Gautam Gambhir from the East Delhi constituency in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. It was a triangular contest with the AAP fielding Atishi against Congress’ Lovely and BJP’s Gambhir. However, Lovely lost the elections by 3,92,000 votes.

Student politics

Born and brought up in Delhi, Lovely did his graduation in Political Science from SGTB Khalsa College of the Delhi University (DU). He was active in student politics during his college days. Later, in 1990, he was elected as the general secretary of the Delhi Youth Congress, and then served as the general secretary of the National Student’s Union of India (NSUI) from 1992 to 1996.

Lovely has been associated with the Congress for almost 30 years. He briefly snapped his ties with the party and joined rival BJP in April 2017. But after a few months, he returned to the Congress stating he was an ‘ideological misfit’ in the BJP.

In the 2020 Delhi election, the Congress had fielded Lovely from his usual Assembly constituency of Gandhi Nagar, but he lost the election to sitting MLA Anil Kumar Bajpai.

Education reforms

Lovely has been the longest serving education minister in Delhi, bringing in many reforms that stand until today. He introduced the Point System of admissions into schools, aiming to abolish bias and corruption in the admission process. He introduced the EWS (Economically Weaker Section) & Laadli Schemes. His efforts to increase inclusiveness in the schools resulted in higher enrollment rates and lower dropout rates. Inheriting a dropout rate of 7.8% in government schools, Lovely lowered this rate to a record-low of 1.7%.

As minister of urban development, Lovely regularised almost 1,000 colonies across Delhi and introduced Delhi Development of Urban Village Scheme, benefitting 135 urban villages covering 45 lakh people.

As minister of transport, Lovely was single-handedly responsible for replacing the Blue Line buses with low floor buses, and more than doubled number of buses, significantly increasing road safety in Delhi. He upgraded the entire Delhi bus fleet to CNG in record-time of 6 months as Transport Minister. He is also credited with the centralisation and interlinking of all transport authorities in Delhi.