Two days after the AAP leadership decided to revoke the suspension of party legislator Amanatullah Khan, senior leader Kumar Vishwas attacked the party leadership’s move, dismissing it as a “kitchen cabinet” decision.

Speaking to The Statesman on Tuesday, Vishwas said he would expose those “who are bent on destroying the party”.

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He said Khan, who had sought to lock horns with him, was just a “pawn” used by some “real players” to oust him from the AAP.

“I know for certain that Khan was just a mask that was being used to malign my image. He could not have said such things against me without the backing of real players in the party,” Vishwas said, referring to a simmering intra-party power struggle. He however did not name anyone in this regard.

In May 2017, Khan had called Vishwas an “agent of the BJP” while accusing him of plotting to split the AAP. Khan was subsequently suspended from the AAP following Vishwas’s complaint that the former was part of a “larger conspiracy” against him. The AAP leadership had then also constituted a three-member committee to look into such charges against Khan.

On Sunday, the three-member panel gave its report to the Arvind Kejriwal-led AAP’s Political Affairs Committee (PAC), declaring that it could not find evidence to back Vishwas’s charges against Khan. The party leadership thus decided to revoke Khan’s suspension.

Firing salvos at the AAP leadership’s move, Vishwas charged that suspending Khan was just a “delaying tactic” to avoid the looming crisis in the party.

“It was just a matter of time before his suspension was revoked. There is a coterie that has been working unrelentingly to somehow oust me from the party,” Vishwas alleged.

He also said soon after he spoke out against Khan’s allegations, the PAC appointed him as the convener of Rajasthan. He said he had urged the party to make him the in-charge of Delhi or Punjab or Gujarat affairs, but his request was turned down.

“Sending me to Rajasthan was also a well-planned strategy to keep me away from the main activities in the party. I knew what they were up to, but I still agreed. And today, because of our party’s hardwork,  the AAP has emerged as a serious contender in Rajasthan for the upcoming election,” Vishwas said.

The rift between Vishwas and some senior AAP leaders had started after the former criticised Kejriwal, party supremo and Delhi Chief Minister, for questioning the surgical strikes on Pakistan and blaming EVMs for the loss in the Punjab polls.

AAP sources said Vishwas was asked by the party repeatedly not to speak against its leaders but he continued to go after them.

One of the founding members of the AAP, Vishwas has, however, refused to quit the AAP.

“There is no point of quiting the party. The AAP was born out of Anna (Hazare’s 2011) agitation and I still have not left the Ramlila Maidan,” he said, adding that the leaders who switched to the AAP fold from the BJP and the Congress cannot decide its future.