At a time when its affairs are getting murkier in Punjab and the Rajasthan crisis remains unresolved, the Congress’ troubles in Chhattisgarh look set to increase in the coming days.
Amid speculation over the possibility of a leadership change in Chhattisgarh, a group of Congress MLAs known to be close to Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel are camping in Delhi to oppose any move to replace him. In fact, one of them asserted that there was no question of a change at the top in the state and Baghel would complete his full term.
AICC sources said around 15 party MLAs are in Delhi and they want to meet AICC in-charge Chhattisgarh P L Punia to convey that former Congress chief Rahul Gandhi should extend the duration of his proposed tour to the state so that all MLAs can get benefit of it.
Punia, however, is in Lucknow till the end of this week, sources in party said.
Brihaspat Singh, the Ramanujganj MLA, said that they were waiting for Punia and would speak with him when he would return.
“The situation in Chhattisgarh is not like that of Punjab. Our party has 70 MLAs (in the 90-member state assembly), of whom 60 legislators had last time conveyed their views to Punia and the high command,” Singh told the media.
“The high command gave a chief minister from the OBC community with 54 per cent OBCs in the state. The high command gives the example of Chhattisgarh government’s policies during elections in other states, so there is no such question (of leadership change),” Singh said.
As far as the BJP people are concerned, if they think they can make the government fall by misleading “Maharaja of Sarguja” (reference to T S Singhdeo) as they did in Madhya Pradesh by misleading “Gwalior Maharaja” (a reference to Jyotiraditya Scindia), they will not be successful, Singh said.
“Our Maharaja of Sarguja is very intelligent, very knowledgeable and has himself stated that he will never leave the party. So there is no possibility and under the leadership of Bhupesh Baghel, together with T S Singhdeo, the government will continue to work for the development of the state,” the MLA said.
Baghel is doing a great job and “we will work under his leadership for five years and will fight elections under his leadership in the future with the blessings of Rahul Gandhi”, he added.
The buzz in political circles in Chhattisgarh over legislators having gone to express their support to Baghel comes in the wake of the Punjab political crisis for the party.
The demand for a change of guard reared its head in Chhattisgarh after Baghel completed two and a half years as chief minister in June 2021. The Singhdeo camp claimed that the high command in 2018 had agreed to hand over the post to him after the government completed half its term.
Congress in-charge of the state Punia has time and again denied that any such deal was struck in 2018 when the party came to power by dislodging the BJP.
The Congress high command summoned both Baghel and Singh Deo to Delhi in August to resolve the feud. It appeared that Baghel had managed to avert for the time being a leadership change when he told reporters upon return that party leader Rahul Gandhi had agreed to visit the state ‘on his invitation’, and those talking about rotating the CM’s post were promoting political instability.
However, there has been constant speculation over the matter.