Congress’ UP chief Raj Babbar, Amethi district chief Yogendra Misra offer to step down

On whether Babbar’s resignation had been accepted, Bakshi said, “A decision on whether to accept his resignation will be taken at the Congress Working Committee meeting in New Delhi in the coming days.”

Babbar had on Friday morning tweeted and written that he takes responsibility for the poor show of the Congress in Uttar Pradesh. “Congratulations to the winners for gaining the confidence of people. The results are disappointing for the Uttar Pradesh Congress. I hold myself responsible for not being able to complete the responsibility assigned to me. I will talk to the leadership regarding this,” Babbar tweeted in Hindi.

Babbar lost the polls from Fatehpur Sikri by a margin of 4.95 lakh votes to BJP’s Rajkumar Chahar. In 2014, he had lost from Ghaziabad to BJP candidate and former Army chief V K Singh by 5.67 lakh votes. In 2009, he had lost from Fatehpur Sikri to BSP’s Seema Upadhyay by 9,936 votes.

After the Congress’s poor show in the 2017 Uttar Pradesh Assembly polls, Babbar had offered his resignation but it was rejected by the party high command.

The district president of the Congress’s Amethi unit, Yogendra Misra, also offered to resign from his post taking responsibility for the defeat of Congress chief Rahul Gandhi in Amethi to BJP’s Smriti Irani.

Rahul lost the Gandhi bastion to Irani by 55,120 votes.