Kesri yields ground to dissidents at CPP meeting

Congress president Sitaram Kesri told party dissidents on Monday evening, March 17, that he would soon announce organisational elections for which they had been agitating over the last several weeks.

Kesri's assurance appeared to pacify dissidents though frayed tempers between supporters of the Kesri and P V Narasimha Rao camps were evident during the two-hour meeting.

A party joint secretary said Kesri opened the proceedings and assured his critics that he was not averse to holding free and fair organisation elections. Kesri appealed to party members to unite at such a crucial hour when the Congress is seeking its pre-eminence.

However, dissidents, all Rao supporters, vented their wrath at Kesri for ignoring party policies laid down by the former premier.

They said by giving party tickets to hawala-tainted Congress members for the recent polls, Kesri had indicated that he was not concerned about the overall interests of the Congress but those of his hand-picked followers.

Known Rao loyalists like Dr Jagannath Mishra, Suresh Kalmadi and Sundar Singh Ahluwalia clashed with their rivals in the Kesri camp like Ajit Jogi and G Venkataswamy over the issue of holding the organisation elections.

The Congress joint secretary emphasised that while Rao loyalists were adamant that organisational elections could not be postponed under any pretext, Kesri's supporters took the stance that the CPP should stick to discussing matters on which it was competent, instead of encroaching oh the turf of the Congress Working Committee.

However, the party chief's assurance of going ahead with the organisation elections had mostly cooled frayed tempers, the party joint secretary pointed out.

While the Rao loyalists are exuberant with what they regard as their first victory at the meeting, Kesri supporters led by Ajit Jogi maintained that they had succeeded in outwitting Rao's supporters.

Asked whether the dissidents had won a victory by forcing Kesri to give the assurance regarding the organisation elections, Jogi said "Kesriji was going ahead with the organisation elections anyway so what was the need to talk about it."

The CPP meeting was ample indication that the Rao camp, which had been preparing for a confrontation with the rival Kesri camp, has now moved in for the kill. It also showed that Rao is guiding his loyalists in his continuing struggle against the party chief. Rao's Motilal Nehru Marg residence is a bi-weekly meeting point of the Congress dissidents.

Interestingly, the Kesri camp does not think that it has lost advantage to party dissidents. A close aide of Jogi pointed out that Rao's camp has many brahmins and that the party chief would henceforth play the OBC card to nullify the designs of "the brahmins in the Rao camp".