Anita Katyal| Did Kharge send a signal to Rahul with talk about pro-people issues?
Doing some plain speaking in his opening address at the last meeting of the Congress Working Committee, party president Mallikarjun Kharge admonished squabbling leaders, observed that Congress members are often their own worst enemies and castigated the cadre for its failure to take advantage of the gains made in the Lok Sabha elections. The Hindi language version of Kharge’s speech put out on media WhatsApp groups first had all these details and more but the synopsis of the speech issued later glossed over his hard-hitting remarks. According to Congress insiders, it was party communications chief Jairam Ramesh’s decision to omit these comments. Pointing to the open display of factionalism, Mr Kharge had said the public statements issued by leaders against each other had done immense harm to the party and warned that the party had the option of taking disciplinary action against erring members. He also pulled up party leaders for complaining about the Congress’ inability to set the narrative, stating that it is their job to do so. Admitting that the Congress performance in the recent Assembly polls had been “below expectations”, Mr Kharge said the party should identify and highlight local issues in their Assembly poll campaigns as national issues, though important, do not always resonate with the people. This was seen as a message to Rahul Gandhi who persisted with his focus on “Samvidhan khatre mein hai” in the Assembly elections.
With preparations in full swing for the Delhi Assembly elections, there is considerable chatter about the Bharatiya Janata Party’s chief ministerial candidate. The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh and the party are said to be veering around to project a woman for this post. Lobbying is currently on and it is anybody’s guess as who will make the final cut. As always, former Union minister Smriti Irani, who defeated Rahul Gandhi in Amethi in the 2019 but lost five years later to local Congress worker K.L. Sharma, is always in the news whenever there’s an opening in the party organisation. Ms Irani was lying low after her Lok Sabha defeat but has lately been fielded by the party on several occasions to take on Rahul Gandhi. While Ms Irani is said to be an RSS favourite, former Delhi MP Meenakshi Lekhi’s name is also doing the rounds. Ms Lekhi was denied a ticket in the last Lok Sabha election but was told that the party had bigger plans for her.
As it is to be expected, there was hectic lobbying for plum posts in the run-up to the expansion of the Hemant Soren Cabinet in Jharkhand with the Congress pressing for the deputy chief minister’s post. Having fared reasonably well in the recent Assembly polls thanks to chief minister Soren’s personal popularity and hard work, local Congress leaders tried to drive a hard bargain with him. They argued that since the Congress has contributed 16 valuable Assembly seats to the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha-led alliance, it should be given respectable ministries and the deputy’s chief minister’s post. Mr Soren brushed aside their demand for the deputy’s position and told the state Congress leaders that their pressure tactics would not work and that he had spoken to Rahul Gandhi in this connection. As an alternative, the Congress leaders wanted the next Speaker to be from their party, which was also rejected by Mr Soren. The JMM leader has been upset with the Congress for not doing its best in the Assembly poll campaign, leaving him to do all the heavy lifting.
Priyanka Gandhi Vadra’s arrival in Parliament has predictably generated considerable excitement among Congress MPs. But there is also a flip side to it. Party MPs now have to be on their toes as Priyanka reaches the party office before the Lok Sabha session is scheduled to commence and stays as long as the day’s proceedings are on. She also takes her lunch in Parliament, preferring not to leave the premises. This is a new experience for party MPs who are used to Rahul Gandhi’s frequent absences from Parliament. It’s only been a few days since Priyanka took oath but party members are already finding it difficult to deal with her regular attendance in Parliament. In this respect, the new Wayanad MP is like her mother Sonia Gandhi who may not have spoken too often in the Lok Sabha as Leader of Opposition but she diligently sat through all proceedings.
Zero hour in Parliament is time allotted for members to raise matters of public importance which need to be highlighted immediately like the Manipur violence, poor health facilities in a particular constituency or the state of highways in a state. But the BJP’s latest strategy is to use this parliamentary device to mount a personal attack against Rahul Gandhi as the ruling party is constrained from responding directly to the Congress leader’s charge of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s proximity to industrialist Gautam Adani recently indicted by a US court. It was no coincidence that last week senior MPs Sudhanshu Trivedi and Nishikant Dubey made identical zero hour mentions in the two Houses to charge that foreign forces which included US billionaire investor George Soros were conspiring to destablise India and that Rahul Gandhi was part of it.