A blame game has begun in the Congress on mishandling of party affairs in Uttarakhand against the backdrop of rebellion in its Arunachal Pradesh legislature party and the mess in Assam.
A blame game has begun in the Congress on mishandling of party affairs in Uttarakhand against the backdrop of rebellion in its Arunachal Pradesh legislature party and the mess in Assam.
“What is the point in blaming the BJP or the Centre when our own legislators have revolted against chief minister Harish Rawat,” party insiders pointed out.
According to them, the leadership should have accommodated the anti-Rawat camp just as it had helped the anti-Bhupinder Singh Hooda camp in Haryana and made some of them Rajya Sabha members.
“Vijay Bahuguna was removed as Uttarakhand chief minister but neither he nor his supporters got accommodated in the new set-up... they were ignored, isolated and now his son Saket and party joint secretary Anil Gupta have been expelled for six years. What is the message ” they asked.
The Congress lost power in Arunachal Pradesh after ignoring the anti-Nabam Tuki camp in the CLP. He remained chief minister for over four years till Kalikho Pul became CM on February 19 by revolting against Mr Tuki and floating the People’s Party of Arunachal.
And in Assam, Himanta Biswa Sarma was compelled to leave the party with his supporters after the leadership stood behind chief minister Tarun Gogoi despite the Congress’ poor performance in the Lok Sabha elections. Now, this is helping the BJP gain ground.
Mr Rawat should have been made Uttarakhand CM long back but N.D. Tiwari got the post in 2002 and remained there till 2007.
And when the party came back to power in Uttarakhand in 2012, Mr Bahuguna was the “surprise” choice. Mr Rawat missed the opportunity for a second time but he was brought to the Centre and made Union minister.
The AICC always believes in a balancing act, accommodating different factions while strengthening the CLP leader. But this did not happen in Uttarakhand, Arunachal Pradesh and Assam. The Congress weakened in Maharashtra after the sacking of Ashok Chavan on Adarsh, which was a non-issue. Prithviraj Chavan should have been a “stopgap arrangement” but he remained CM for nearly four years and the party got only two Lok Sabha seats and 42 Assembly seats under his leadership, the insiders pointed out.
