The Congress on Saturday said it had accepted its Mumbai chief Sanjay Nirupam's apology for publishing an article in its journal Congress Darshan that criticised founder Jawaharlal Nehru and termed party president Sonia Gandhi's father a "fascist soldier". The Congress had sacked the journal's content editor Sudhir Joshi in December, soon after the article became public. The party had then issued a notice to Nirupam, the journal's editor, asking him to respond.

A party official told PTI that Nirupam had accepted the responsibility for the "grossly inaccurate, baseless and malicious article" and submitted his "unconditional apology" for the same. The official added that the party's Central Disciplinary Action Committee warned him to be careful in the future and not repeat a "grave mistake" such as this one.