Former Union Finance Minister and senior Congress leader P Chidambaram expressed his displeasure with the party’s leadership for not appointing a popular figure as the head of the Tamil Nadu Congress Committee.
“Only a popular leader would be able to rejuvenate the Congress in Tamil Nadu,” Chidambaram said at Tiruchi on late Saturday evening while addressing a meeting organised by the district Congress committee.The former Finance Minister, whose son Karthi Chidambaram was drubbed by the AIADMK candidate in the 2014 lok Sabha election from Sivaganga, is yet to come out of the shock defeat.
Karthi was mauled in the husting and had to forfeit the deposit in the election. Shivaganga has been a traditional seat of the Congress and Chidambaram had been elected from the constituency eight times.
According to Chidambaram, only a well-known person would be able to rebuild the party in Tamil Nadu. The 2014 lok Sabha election saw the Congress biting the dust in all the 39 constituencies from where it contested. Only Vasanth Kumar, a Chennai-based businessman, who lost to Pon Radhakrishnan of the BJP, could save his deposit in the last election.
Chidambaram’s comment is a snubbing to BS Gnanadesikan, the soft spoken president of the TNCC who led the party campaign in the lok Sabha election. It is being rumoured that Chidambaram may be appointed as TNCC president since Gnanadesikan has submitted his resignation.
He also blamed the leadership for the poor organisational set-up in the party. “There is no link between the party and the people and this has to be changed. I’ll take up the matter with the central leadership,” said Chidambaram.Gnanadesikan’s snubbing by Chidambaram has reportedly upset former Union Minister GK Vasan, son of late GK Moopanar, a Nehru-Gandhi family acolyte.Gnanadesikan is a nominee of Vasan and an old Moopanar loyalist. The TNCC is seeing a running battle between Chidambaram and Vasan for the control of the party.