Sidhu’s adviser Mali resigns amid row

Chandigarh, Aug. 27: Under fire over his controversial comments on Kashmir, Malvinder Singh Mali on Friday quit as adviser to Punjab Congress chief Navjot Singh Sidhu.

However, Mali did not term it as a “resignation”.

In a statement posted on his Facebook page, Mali said, “I humbly submit that I withdraw my consent given for tendering suggestions to Navjot Singh Sidhu.”

In another Facebook post, he claimed that the question of his resignation does not arise as he never accepted the post. “Neither accepted any post, nor resigned from any post,” Mali said in a post in Punjabi. Amid a power tussle in Punjab, Chief Minister Amarinder Singh had asked Sidhu on Sunday to “rein in” his advisers after two of them made “atrocious” comments recently on sensitive issues like Kashmir and Pakistan. AICC general secretary Harish Rawat, who is in charge of Punjab affairs, had also said that the two advisers need to go.

In his post, Mali said, “AntiPunjab and anti-Sikh forces, which cannot tolerate the Punjab model and politics of transparency and accountability that has emerged in the backdrop of a peaceful and long-drawn farmers’ agitation, have a nefarious designs to derail the dialogue process that has started taking shape... to fight with tied hands (against such forces) is unacceptable to me and rejecting the same I humbly submit that I withdraw my consent for giving suggestions to Navjot Singh Sidhu.”

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