Factionalism hurting Congress election plans

Bhopal: Unity has eluded the beleaguered Congress in Madhya Pradesh with party heavyweights in the state do not seem to close ranks to meet the challenge from the ruling BJP in the Assembly elections, slated for November.

The leaders were seen working at cross-purposes to further their own interests, leaving the party cadres confused and demoralised.

The change of leadership of Pradesh Congress Committee (PCC) three months ago has hardly helped to galvanise the cadres.

“Barring the rally organised by the party at Mandsaur on June 6 this year where AICC president Rahul Gandhi blew poll bugle for Congress in MP, no mass contact programmes have been organised in the state in the last three months to connect with the electorate.

“Party activities have so far been confined to the state Congress headquarters here where senior leaders were seen busy holding meetings to devise poll strategies without bothering to executive them at the ground level,” a senior Congress leader confided to this newspaper.

“The factional leaders have hardly been seen on one platform to project cohesion in the party. The last time these leaders were seen together in public was on May 1 when a rally was held on the occasion of Kamal Nath taking over as state chief.

Mr Nath (74) was handicapped because of the age factor to connect with the masses and recharge the cadres, the other veteran leader Digvijay Singh has reportedly been restrained from going public by the leadership.

“Mr Nath was expected to unite the factional leaders. However, he is yet to deliver on it,” said a Congress worker.

Congress circles here are rife with rumours that there was a tacit understanding between Mr Nath and Digvijay Singh to pre-empt any move by the AICC leadership to project Guna MP Jyotiraditya Scindia as the CM face, leading to trust deficit among the loyalists of factional leaders.

The Congress Legislature Party (CLP) leader Ajey Singh has been functioning “independently” by undertaking “Nyaya Yatra” across the state “on his own”.

Sources said the CLP leader who was an aspirant for the chief ministerial position has been sulking ever since the leadership made it clear that either Mr Nath or Mr Scindia would be declared the CM face of the party.

Incidentally, AICC general secretary in-charge of MP Deepak Babaria was recently assaulted by some Congress workers for overlooking the case of the CLP leader as chief minister nominee.

Mr Scindia had launched a 40-day mass contact programme covering 10 divisions of the state which ended on June 11 at Ujjain.

The BJP is confident of gaining from Congress factionalism. “The Congress has split into 10 factions. Hence, the party is not in a position to pose a challenge to us,” said BJP national vice-president Prabhat Jha.