The fissures in the Congress were out in the open as the authors of the sensational 'letter of dissent' today came out as a group for the first time, sharing stage with party veteran Ghulam Nabi Azad, the face of the letter-writing endeavour, at a function in Jammu and voicing their concern over the party weakening and lamenting the sidelining of Azad.
The Congress, on the other hand, responded by saying that while the leaders who shared stage in Jammu were highly respected members of the party with long and illustrious records as Congressmen, and were part of the Congress family, it would have been appropriate had they chosen to campaign in the states going to polls.
Azad, who recently retired as a member of the Rajya Sabha, had arrived in Jammu on Friday on a three-day visit. At a function organised by Gandhi Global Family, an NGO he heads, he was accompanied by fellow writers of the 'letter of dissent' such as Anand Sharma, Bhupinder Singh Hooda, Kapil Sibal, Manish Tewari, Vivek Tankha and Raj Babbar.
At the function—one of the few events lined up till tomorrow to felicitate Azad—the leaders, by appearing together with him, presented a picture of solidarity and sought to convey the message that the veteran leader could not be written off after his retirement from the Rajya Sabha and his tenure as Leader of Opposition in the upper house coming to an end.
The effort, it was apparent, was also to convey to the party leadership the message that they will continue to press their demands made in their letter to Congress president Sonia Gandhi in August last year.
Speaking on the occasion, Azad declared that he had retired from Parliament and not from politics. He also said that this was not the first time he had retired from Parliament.
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While he did not refer to the letter sent by the 'G23' to the party chief. He referred to the presence of the other 'dissident' leaders on the stage, saying that in the last five to six years, they did not speak any less than him in Parliament over Jammu and Kashmir, the issue of unemployment or the taking away of its statehood.
He was critical of the Centre's decisions with regard to Jammu and Kashmir, and said the Congress had raised all issues, be it of statehood or unemployment, in Parliament. He said, in the context of Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh regions, that the Congress respects all religions, people and castes. “We equally respect everyone. That is our strength and we will continue to do so,” he said.
Senior leader Kapil Sibal was more forthright, saying that the truth is that the Congress has weakened. “The truth is that we are seeing that the Congress party is getting weak. That is why we have gathered here. We had gathered earlier too. We have to strengthen the party,” he said.
With regard to Azad, Sibal said, “He is one leader who knows the ground reality of the Congress in every district of the state. We were saddened to know that he was being freed from Parliament. I cannot understand why the Congress is not using his experience,” he said.
Senior leader Anand Sharma said that nobody should have the misconception that Azad has retired. “He was not in a government job that he retired,” said Sharma, who was Azad's deputy in the upper house and was overlooked for the post of Leader of Opposition in favour of Mallikarjun Kharge.
Sharma said that the Congress has weakened in the last decade and that he and the other leaders who wrote to the party president wanted the party to be strengthened everywhere again. “The new generation should connect to the party. We have seen the good days of the Congress. We don't want to see it weakening as we grow older,” he said.
“All of us have covered a long distance to reach where we are today. None of us has come through a window. We have all walked through the door. We have come from the students' movement,” he said.
Sharma said it was for the first time since 1950 that Jammu and Kashmir does not have a representative in the Rajya Sabha. “This will be corrected,” he said.
Lok Sabha MP Manish Tewari tweeted to say that it was an impressive gathering, and noted that the Gandhi Global Family platform had brought progressive, pluralistic and nationalistic forces together to demand restoration of statehood of Jammu and Kashmir and to protect and preserve the idea of India.
Former UP Congress chief Raj Babbar said the group of leaders should instead of being labelled as 'G23' be called 'Gandhi23' since they only wanted to take forward the ideals of Mahatma Gandhi and make the party strong again.
The leaders are planning to organise public meetings in other parts of the country to campaign for 'saving the idea of India' in the face of the BJP's aggressive pursuance of majoritarian politics. There are plans of holding meetings in Ludhiana and Kurukshetra to begin with.
“The best contribution to the Congress cause would be to be active not amongst ourselves but in the campaign in the five states that are going to polls,” AICC spokesperson Abhishek Manu Singhvi said when asked to respond on comments made by Azad and the other leaders in Jammu.
In reaction to Sibal's lament that the party was not using Azad's experience, Singhvi said it betrayed ignorance about the party's contemporary and past history and went on to recount Azad has been a Member of Parliament for seven terms—three in the Rajya Sabha and two in the Lok Sabha—was nominated by Sonia Gandhi as chief minister of Jammu and Kashmir, was a general secretary of the party for more than two decades, and a Union minister during the tenure of Indira Gandhi, as also in UPA-I and II.
Singhvi parried questions on whether the leaders were guilty of indiscipline, saying his response covered all aspects of the issue.
The feeling of bitterness among the G23 has grown recently because of the manner in which Azad was eased out and his deputy in the upper house, Anand Sharma, was overlooked for the post of Leader of Opposition. Azad has also been conspicuously kept out of the seat-sharing negotiations in Tamil Nadu despite his rich experience of having handled party affairs in the state. Hooda is learnt to be unhappy with the growing importance of AICC communications department head Randeep Surjewala and Haryana PCC chief Kumari Selja in the scheme of things.
The move by the dissident leaders is significant since it comes in the backdrop of the Congress Working Committee having decided that the election to the post of party president would be held after the assembly elections scheduled for April-May, and the party declaring that a new president would be in place in June.
