Rahul and Azad had a few run-ins in the past as well.

New Delhi, Aug 26 : In a significant political shift in the country, top Congress leader Ghulam Nabi Azad resigned from the Congress on Friday, following an admonition at Rahul Gandhi in his resignation letter of five pages.

But, after Rahul Gandhi started making decisions in a direct manner, Azad felt sidelined in the party with the latest resentment resulted from Azad not being involved in the election to select the next Congress President.In June Sonia Gandhi had offered the No.two position in the party however Azad had rejected the offer.Sources claimed that Azad believed that he might be the number.2 in the party however, its Rahul Gandhi who is going to make the decisions.Azads relationship with Rahul Gandhi hasnt been pleasant in the time since Azad was Leader of the Opposition in the Rajya Sabha (2014 to 2021) in which he stood up against the Congress in the House.

Then the PM Narendra Modi had praised Azad during his speech to mark the funeral of Azad, but Azads Padma Bhushan award for Azad that followed only made matters worse.After Azads departure of the GNA party, the senior Congress chief Jairam Ramesh tweeted "A person who has been treated with the highest respect from the Congress leadership has sabotaged it by his personal attacks that reveal his real character.The DNA of GNA has been altered.

" In his last meeting with Rahul Gandhi Sources close to Azad stated that he did not receive the respect that Sonia Gandhi gave him, and Rahul even reportedly addressed the former president by his initials.However, their relationship got worse after Azad was refused an Rajya Sabha seat following assurances, but Rahul Gandhi had vetoed the request.

Azad in his resignation letter , Azad accused CWC members of disgraced his character after the G-23 leaders sent an open note to Sonia Gandhi "The only offense committed by the 23 top leaders who wrote the letter of concerns for the party was that they outlined the main reasons for the flaws in the party and suggested solutions to them.However instead of taking these views into consideration in an open and constructive manner, we were degraded, abused and humiliated, scolded, and denigrated in an extra-convened gathering of the extended CWC meeting," he said "In the month of August of 2020, when I and 22 senior members which included the former Union Ministers and Chief Ministers wrote to you to express our concern about the disastrous drift in the party the coterie decided to unleash their sycophants upon us and we were slammed, beaten, denigrated and humiliated in the most crude way feasible," he added in the letter addressed to Sonia Gandhi.

The veteran leader claimed that, following the directives of the group that manages the AICC today the faux funeral procession carried out in Jammu and the people who were guilty of this infraction were praised in Delhi by the general secretaries of the AICC and Rahul Gandhi personally.miz/ar.