Barely three months ahead of crucial Assembly polls in BJP-ruled Chhattisgarh, Congress veteran and State’s first Chief Minister Ajit Jogi has launched an open war against his own party which has raised fear that a split in the party in the mineral-rich State is on the cards
Jogi who is said to be sidelined by the party High Command in the State, has been on a whirlwind tour of the State since Sunday. He has been announcing his own candidates and even asking people to vote only for them in the 90-member Assembly polls scheduled to be held by November.Surprisingly, Jogi supporters who turned up in large numbers on Sunday at Aklatara and Abhanpur Assembly constituency areas and on Monday in Chandrapur and Patan constituency areas, raised slogans ‘Jo Jogi ki baat karega, Chhattisgarh me raj karega’.
Even Jogi chose to skip mentioning the customary references of Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi at the start of these public meetings where surprisingly not a single flag of the Congress party was spotted.Even Jogi went one step further at the public meetings and declared his supporters’ names and appealed people to vote for them in the upcoming polls. In Abhanpur constituency area, Jogi asked the gathering to vote for a suspended Congress leader Radhakishan Tandon.
Abhanpur is a stronghold of Jogi’s opponent and former State Congress chief Dhanendra Sahu while Jogi’s long-time critic and former Minister Bhupesh Baghel is the lone ticket aspirant for the Congress from Patan seat.While in Aklatara BSP legislator Saurabh Singh quit his party this month and joined the Congress despite strong protest by Jogi. The Congress has also inducted Nobel Verma, a former NCP MlA from Chandrapur, into party ignoring Jogi’s advice.
Sources close to Jogi claim “the former Chief Minister will no longer tolerate his neglect by the party High Command in Chhattisgarh and he is now ready to take all decisions and steps that include engineering a split as well’’.Jogi’s close aides claim that Central leadership of the Congress has been taking all decisions in Chhattisgarh under the influence of party national general secretary Digvijay Singh by ignoring Jogi’s clout in the State that has 32 per cent Scheduled Tribe and 14 per cent Scheduled Caste population.
“The Gandhi family first appointed Charandas Mahant, an ardent supporter of Digvijay Singh, as Chhattisgarh State working president and then a full-fledged party president without consulting Jogi. Even Jogi’s request for accommodating his son Amit Jogi in the State officer-bearers list was outrightly rejected,’’ a key Jogi supporter told The Pioneer, adding, “now time has come to re-establish the fact through ballots that minus Jogi the Congress has no future in the State”.
Meanwhile, the stunned Congress leadership in the State has urged the Central leadership to “urgently take steps to keep Jogi in check”.Jogi is diplomatically offering thoughts to media that he is conducting meetings in certain areas on invites of the Akhil Bharatiya Satnami Kalyan Samiti to mark the death anniversary of Minimata, a renowned social reformer of Chhattisgarh who belonged to the Dalit Satnami Community.
Jogi claims that the Samiti, which is a social organisation, has hired a chopper for him to travel across the State for several days since Sunday. On being contacted, Jogi’s lone son Amit Jogi remarked, “These are social meetings and have nothing to do with politics. The media misunderstood about these public meetings.’’