One after another Congress MLAs and MPs from Assam are deserting the Grand Old Party. Recently, Assam Rajya Sabha member and chief whip of the Congress in the House, Bhubaneshwar Kalita resigned the day Article 370 was abrogated because he was in sync with the legislation. He felt that the Congress party was not able to read the mood of the nation which was all for scrapping of the above Article which would finally establish Kashmir as an integral part of India. He joined the BJP on August 9 at the Party Headquarters in Delhi. Following in the footsteps of Kalita is the former the Congress minister and prominent Barak valley leader Gautam Roy, who joined the BJP on Sunday, along with former Rajya Sabha member Santiuse Kujur. Another Congress leader, Hiranya Bhuyan, president of Assam Pradesh Youth Congress and the party candidate from Tezpur in the 2016 assembly election, also joined BJP along with Roy and Kujur. Earlier the former Congress MLA from Tinsukia Rajendra Prasad Singh who is a three time member also joined the BJP.
Rajya Sabha member from Assam, Sanjay Singh too had joined the BJP much earlier. Stories are now doing the rounds that former Assam Speaker Bharat Narah and his wife Rani Narah, former MP too would leave the Congress and jump into the BJP bandwagon.
After the resignation of Rahul Gandhi as AICC President, the Congress has been in a no-win situation. Priyanka Gandhi’s name was floated around but failed to evoke the right responses. There are many young leaders in the Congress Party but their seniors feel they don’t have a pan-Indian appeal. A Party that does not have the courage to go for an election to elect a leader is a party that lacks confidence. Sonia Gandhi taking over the leadership yet again is uninspiring to many. Even Jyotiraditya Scindia an articulate young leader expressed that he agreed with the abrogation of 370 because that was almost a national consensus and political parties cannot sail against the tide.
Stories have also been doing the rounds that some from Meghalaya too would be abandoning the sinking ship sooner than later. Perhaps they are weighing their options because those who decide to join another Party individually would have to resign their MLA seats and contest elections once again. That’s a bit dicey for those who are unsure of being re-elected. But it is a fact that the Congress in Meghalaya is fast losing steam.