A fresh crisis is simmering within the Congress after the party on Thursday threatened disciplinary action against its senior leader Janardan Dwivedi for praising Prime Minister Narendra Modi. AICC head of communication Ajay Maken said the party will decide on initiating action against Dwivedi, who once again clarified he was merely analysing the factors that influenced the outcome of the 2014 lok Sabha polls. Dwivedi also called on former Union Minister and senior party leader AK Antony, who heads the party’s Disciplinary Committee, to keep his side.
A section within the party, in the meantime, pointed to Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi’s own pro-AAP remarks after its remarkable performance in the 2013 Delhi Assembly to question any possible action against him. While praising the grand debut of AAP and Arvind Kejriwal in Delhi, Rahul had said that the new party has succeeded by encouraging involvement of people and there is a need to learn from it.
With Dwivedi’s remarks hogging media space, Maken convened an urgent media briefing to condemn his remarks in the strongest possible words.
“What Dwivedi has said is totally opposite to the Congress’ idea of Indianness.... The victory of Modi can by no stretch be the victory of Indianness,” Maken said. While Maken is the current head of communication department, Dwivedi held the position before him.
Maken made it clear that the top party leadership will soon decide on the disciplinary action against Dwivedi, who maintained he was a victim of improper understanding of what he had said and the intention behind his remarks. He reiterated his stand that he had not praised Modi and he was being misquoted. In his meeting with Antony, Dwivedi explained his position and awaiting response.
Talking to media separately, Dwivedi ducked questions on whether he sees a conspiracy behind what has been reported against him and if he had given any explanation to the leadership. “You know I never talk about internal party matters.”
Asserting that he has been grossly misquoted, the senior Congress leader, who was also a professor, said that in his first book itself he had written that Mahatma Gandhi, Prem Chand, Ram Manohar lohia, Suryakant Nirala and Pandit Nehru symbolised Indianness.
Interestingly, Maken quoted from former PM Indira Gandhi’s address at Kashi Vidyapeeth in January, 1970 on Bharatiyata or Indianness. He recalled what the late prime minister had said, “To me, Indianness implies a positive duty to understand and honour other points of view in consonance with the injunction that the ways to truth are many.”
As the party’s face of Delhi in the Assembly polls, Maken took the opportunity to point out that in the last seven months of President’s rule in Delhi, which saw the Modi Government running the show, several incidents of violence including in Trilokpuri and Bawana were witnessed. He also pointed to the 2002 riots in Gujarat when Modi was the Chief Minister to say he can never become the symbol of that Indianness.
The differing voices within the Congress comes at a time when there is already a buzz with the party about a power tussle between the young turks and old guards owing allegiance to Rahul Gandhi and Sonia Gandhi respectively.
A senior party leader also reminded that Rahul had also said that political parties (inclduing Congress) are not giving adequate voice to the common man and vowed to aggressively work towards changing the situation in Congress.
“I think the AAP involved a lot of people who the traditional political parties did not involve. We are going to learn from that and do a better job than anybody in the country and involve people in ways you cannot even imgaine now. Through this (Delhi Assembly 2013) election, the public has given us a message. I and the Congress have listened to this message,” Rahul had said addressing the media on December 8, 2013 after Kejriwal led party bagged 27 seats and reduced the Congress to single digit party.