Cradle-Rocked Hands

Though the triggers for dissent have been varied, the outcome has always been the same. With each uprising, the family바카라�s control over the organisation has only grown. The mutineers have바카라�with very few exceptions바카라�either drawn their one-way ticket into political obscurity or returned to the parent organisation; their hands folded in obeisance to the Nehru-Gandhis. The exceptions who prevailed바카라�be it Sharad Pawar in Maharashtra, Mamata Banerjee in Bengal, the late Mufti Mohammad Sayeed in Kashmir or Y.S. Jaganmohan Reddy in Andhra바카라�were electorally confined to their respective home states despite formidable political skills. Undoubtedly, this salami slicing weakened the GOP regionally but it also cemented further, the indispensability of the Nehru-Gandhis to the Congress.

The orchestrated shaming of the 23 signatories at the recent Congress Working Committee (CWC) meeting made it clear that the party is in no mood to digress from the formula of crushing dissent that has served the Nehru-Gandhis well for nearly 50 years. 바카라�You cannot change the nature of the beast,바카라� one of the signatories tells Outlook, while insisting that 바카라�not one word in our letter was a challenge to the leadership but all of us have been branded as traitors.바카라�

Officially, the Congress has maintained that issues raised by the letter writers will be addressed 바카라�in due course바카라�. Sonia바카라�s closing remarks at the CWC meet too suggested her willingness to move forward without bitterness. Those demanding reform have also publicly welcomed the CWC resolution endorsing the demand for a 바카라�full-time president바카라� to be elected at an AICC session that is likely to be convened within the next six months. 바카라�The CWC resolution is very clear and all concerns flagged by the leaders will also be addressed by the party,바카라� says Congress general secretary (organisation) K.C. Venugopal.

However, several signatories of the letter that Outlook spoke to says they would believe the assurances made at the CWC only after these are put into effect. At the CWC, sources say, there was a consensus to constitute a committee to assist Sonia in running the party. There had also been speculation that at least one of the 23 signatories may find a place on this committee. However, this was not reflected in the CWC resolution. A senior CWC member says, 바카라�A full-time president will be appointed soon, so there is no hurry to make these changes. Let the full-time president be elected and he can decide to form such a committee.바카라�

Congress sources say Rahul, who is likely to return as party president when the AICC session is finally convened, is still livid over the letter episode and it is his unease with the signatories that is driving the attacks on those seeking leadership reforms. Former Karnataka chief minister Veerappa Moily, who was among the signatories says: 바카라�We knew the repercussions for our action, but we went ahead because we have a duty.바카라�

The repercussions didn바카라�t take long to unravel. Soon after, Sonia formed a five-member intra-party committee to formulate the Congress바카라�s stand on key ordinances brought by the Narendra Modi government. The panel includes party leaders P. Chidambaram, Digvijaya Singh, Jairam Ramesh, Amar Singh and Gaurav Gogoi. Next, Sonia reconstituted committees for coordinating the Congress바카라�s parliamentary strategy and named party whips for the Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha. Those included in these committees were Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury, Gogoi (also made deputy leader in LS), Ghulam Nabi Azad, Anand Sharma (leader of opposition and party deputy leader in RS respectively), Jairam Ramesh (also named chief whip in RS), Ahmed Patel, Venugopal, K. Suresh, Manickam Tagore and Ravneet Singh Bittu.

The letter writers claim that the formation of these committees sends clear signals. Barring Azad and Sharma, who were retained in the parliament strategy group by virtue of the posts they hold in the Rajya Sabha, none of the 23 signatories were accommodated in these panels. Leaders like Kapil Sibal, Manish Tewari and Shashi Tharoor, who are well versed with legal and parliamentary matters, were left out. The panels show a clear imprint of Rahul Gandhi as Venugopal, Gogoi, Bittu and Tagore are considered part of his 바카라�cabal바카라�. A Congress MP and signatory to the letter says, 바카라�Every appointment made in the Congress over the past year has Rahul바카라�s seal even though he claims to have given up his leadership claim.바카라� The MP asserts: 바카라�We have no issues with Rahul바카라�s involvement; in fact, we would have welcomed him back as party chief, but then this back-seat driving has to end because it adds to the confusion over our leadership.바카라�

Congress sources say the next few months are likely to see more 바카라�dramatic changes바카라� within the organisation and that these could reflect a 바카라�changed demographic that Rahul is more comfortable to work with바카라�. This suggests that more veterans바카라�simply said, the letter writers바카라�may either find themselves without a job or be relegated to punishment postings in states where the Congress is a fringe electoral entity. 바카라�The letter writers claim they are anguished over the shrinking Congress footprint, so they should have no problem with taking up organisational responsibilities in states like Odisha, Tamil Nadu, Telangana, Andhra or the Northeast to revive the party,바카라� says a Sonia confidante.  

A key member of the letter-writer group tells Outlook that the leadership should not be under the impression that packing off the signatories to difficult states would dampen their push for reform but adds that the 바카라�smear campaign바카라� against them must stop. 바카라�Ghulam Nabi, Wasnik, and others have served the party in states where the Congress had little presence left바카라�if the party decides to give them a similar assignment again, they will go, but if vested interests continue to undermine them, then it is the party that will suffer not the individual.바카라�

The Congress high command, says another signatory, needs to realise that 바카라�by going after us, the party only stands to suffer more humiliation바카라�. He adds: 바카라�These sycophants need to realise that if damaging the party was our intent, we could have done so without writing the letter바카라�still, if the leadership thinks that it wants to allow this mudslinging, then it is asking for things to become ugly바카라�imagine the message it would send to the public if even half of us resign.바카라�

What seems to have given confidence to the status quoists in the Congress to launch their counter-revolt against the reformists is that the majority of the signatories are 바카라�leaders with no mass base who have grown in stature because of the very system they are now abusing바카라�, says a loyalist.

Besides, most of the signatories are at the fag-end of their career, a fact that the Rahul loyalists, perhaps, believe makes the mutineers expendable. 바카라�The earlier rebellions in the Congress were by leaders who commanded a mass base and could still rally support, but even they failed to dislodge the Gandhis. From Kamaraj to Sharad Pawar, no one has been able to push the Gandhis out of public imagination. Forget winning state polls, the people who are talking about leadership today do not even have support to win a seat in the CWC if there were internal elections,바카라� says a young Congress leader.

The acerbic verbal duel that the letter has triggered may not end anytime soon. It would, however, be interesting to see to what end this raging internal feud veers. Will the reformists stake their all and walk out of the party to prove their point or will they, like another category of past Congress rebels that hasn바카라�t been recounted above, make their peace with the Gandhis and prove themselves indispensable to the party afresh? After all, party veterans and current family favourites A.K. Antony and P. Chidambaram had also parted ways with the Congress once, as had the late Pranab Mukherjee, only to win back favour with the first family.