New Delhi: A vertical split in Delhi’s ruling Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) may have become imminent with the stage set the expulsion of two rebel founder leaders.

A stormy National Council meeting scheduled for Saturday may witness sharp exchanges between the factions owing allegiance to party chief Arvind Kejriwal and those close to rebel leaders Yogendra Yadav and Prashant Bhushan.

In a bizarre development, the party has already announced that resignations of Yadav and Bhushan from the National Executive of the party have been accepted while the rebel duo has been daring Kejriwal faction to produce their resignation letters, claiming a conditional offer to quit cannot be termed as formal resignation letters.

A day before the National Council meeting, things escalated sharply with both camps going public with accusations and counter-accusations with Yadav and Bhushan charging Kejriwal camp of spreading lies.

“We raised questions on internal democracy within the party. We raised demands for a need of more powers to the state units. We raised demands to launch probe through an internal Lokpal into the allegations that have been levelled on their party. We raised the demand that the voice of the volunteer must be heard. We said that the rule of transparency that we demand from others should also be applied internally upon us. We asked the posts at the national level of the party which are vacant to be filled up,” Yadav said on Friday at a press conference he addressed along with Bhushan.

The two leaders were earlier this month removed from the party’s apex decision making body Political Affairs Committee due to their differences with Kejriwal.

The party officially announced on Thursday that talks with Yadav and Bhushan had failed and that the party had accepted their resignations from the National Executive.

“He [Kejriwal] never worked in a democratic set up where views of others are heard. I spoke to him about this several times but he never paid any heed to it and instead said that his is how he works,” Bhushan said.

Bhushan further said that the representatives who reached out to them had only one-point agenda of procuring their resignations. “The representatives only spoke about two things. One, we were told that our demands will be [acted] upon but we should resign from the National Executive of the party. Secondly, we were told that there will be probe into the affairs of the party but if there are questions about the top leadership, those will not be investigated ... It was made clear to us that Kejriwal did not want to work with us,” Bhushan said.

Yadav and Bhushan sent a message to Kejriwal, who took over as the Delhi chief minister last month after the AAP’s landslide victory in Delhi legislative assembly elections, seeking appointment with him after Kejriwal returned to Delhi after treatment in the southern metropolis Bengaluru.

Kejriwal responded that he was preoccupied with the Vote on Account that he government presented in the Delhi assembly this week and instead sent his representatives.

The AAP National Council is expected to reject Kejriwal’s offer to step down as convener of the party that makes him its chief and may also accept the resolution to either suspend or expel Yadav and Bhushan from the party.

AAP’s constitution does not bar an individual from holding twin posts and thus Kejriwal will continue to be the party chief as well as the Delhi chief minister.

His supporters say Yadav and Bhushan wanted to depose Kejriwal as the AAP convener and replace him with Yadav in the post.

The rebel duo is getting support from party volunteers and several state unit leaders.

Sources close to them indicated that they may consider the option of launching their own breakaway party if they are thrown out of AAP.