By Nora Chopra
The 129-year-old Congress party can split if things remain static and the rectification process is delayed any further. Resentment is brewing high within the rank and file against the Congress leadership, particularly against Rahul Gandhi and his advisers. Disillusionment is taking over the Congress workers from booth level to the highest level. From MPs to MLAs in all the states to Congress workers one can hear the voices of dissent. After Rahul Gandhi refused to the responsibility of being the party leader in the Lok Sabha. An open revolt is visible. What kind of a leader is he who cannot take on the opposition from the front, say the majority in the party! Senior leader like Bhanwar Lal Sharma, Milind Deora once a close friend of Rahul, Priya Dutt, and even senior party veterans like Krishna Chand Deo from Andhra have come out in the open blaming Rahul and his advisers for the worst ever debacle in Congress history. There has been no change in Rahul’s attitude. He continues like before and while all other parties like the SP and the BSP started work next day but nothing seems to be moving here. He has not even learnt anything from his grandmother. Indira Gandhi took to streets immediately after she lost in 1977 and could get her party back to power in 1980. But at the rate Rahul is moving, he has only instilled frustration amongst the workers who will not wait for him, said a senior party veteran on condition of anonymity. With elections due in another couple of months in Maharashtra, Haryana and Delhi, if he fails to perform the restless party workers will quit the Congress. Already some MLAs of Delhi are in touch with the BJP said a former MP from Andhra Pradesh. Most ex MPs from UP are critical of Rahul on giving Madhusudan Mistry, the man who is charged of the entire UP mess up, the authority to review the reasons for the defeat. He should have been sacked already but he has now convened a meeting of those candidates who lost the elections to ask them the reasons of their defeat. ‘Ek hare hue Mistry ki garage mein ja rahe hain yeh batane ke hum haare kyon,’ was a remark made by an ex UP MP. Despite that the Congress lost in UP MP Gujarat Mohan Prakash continues to be the general secretary incharge of Maharashtra where elections are due. Party will split and people will leave the party said another ex MP from Maharashtra where Shiv Sena is in touch with MLAs in the Vidharba region and is wooing them to their fold.
COURTING LAW, LIKE THEY DID BEFORE
While BJP has only Arun Jaitley as a famous lawyer, Congress had too many of them. Now having lost the Lok Sabha elections, all the lawyers in the Congress from Kapil Sibal to Salman Khurshid to Manish Tiwari, have gone back to practicing law again. Salman is now the Tehelka editor Tarun Tejpal’s lawyer. He recently got Tejpal’s bail extended. Kapil who had a flourishing practice and was among the most famous senior Delhi lawyers till he took up politics as his main vocation, immediately after he lost the election he got his bar licence renewed that would enable him to get back to practicing law. Manish Tiwari, who did not even contest the election due to health reasons, is also back in the court.
JAITLEY SCORES OVER RAJNATH, FOR NOW
Despite the Bharatiya Janata Party assuming power, the one-upmanship between the top Delhi leaders continues to dominate BJP politics and Narendra Modi like a good referee knows how to maintain the balance. This time in the government formation it was Arun Jaitley who is seen as a winner. Jaitley who lost the Lok Sabha elections despite the sweeping victory could manage the maximum out of Modi, indicating that he is the number two after Modi. Jaitley has not only managed to pocket two important portfolios himself but has managed prime portfolios for his four protégés. Prakash Javadekar, (I&B ) Nirmala Sitharaman (Commerce and Industry) Piyush Goyal (coal) plus Dharmendra Pradhan (gas and petroleum). Out of the four, two – Sitharaman and Javadekar – were denied even a Rajya Sabha nomination as then believed to be the workmanship of the party president Rajnath Singh. After Jaitley lost there was a sigh of relief in the Rajnath camp, which was keeping its fingers crossed. But to their utter dismay, Jaitley not only managed the best and maximum portfolios for himself and his loyalist but even ensured that some of Singh’s protégés do not find place in Modi government. The most glaring example is of Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi, who was a known protégé of Rajnath. Naqvi has not only been denied the cabinet berth, but is now hardly seen on television where he was a well known face. These days the BJP office is reverberating with slogans like Abki Baar Modi Sarkar Nahin. Abki Baar Jaitley Sarkar. As for Narendra Modi, he appears to have taken cues from Indira Gandhi’s political diary, where she was famous for keeping Congress leaders on tenterhooks by giving one weightage over the other and then reversing it.
VASUNDHARA CRIBS, NO CRUMBS FROM MODI
Despite the landslide victory of the BJP, the infighting within the BJP continues unabated. Vasundhara Raje Scindia, who got all her 25 MPs elected from Rajasthan, is extremely upset with the party bosses over her state being denied of a cabinet berth. Out of the 46 ministers, only one Rajasthan MP Nihal Chand has been made MoS. She was bargaining for her son Dushyant to be given a cabinet berth. One day before the swearing-in ceremony, she along with some of her MPs, had met the party president and the Prime Minister-designate to bargain for a cabinet berth for her son and had threatened even to boycott the swearing in ceremony if her demand was not met. So upset was the Rajasthan CM that at 4 in the evening of 26th May the day the swearing in was to take place she collected all her MP s and decided to boycott the ceremony. But later on some good sense prevailed on her after she was conveyed of some the possibility of adverse consequences. Vasu, who is not on good terms with either Rajnath Singh or Nitin Gadkari, had no option but to finally fall in line. The buzz in the state unit of the party is that she can float her own outfit if things do not work in her favour. (IPA)
