ELECTIONS '98
COMMENTARY
SPECIALS
INTERVIEWS
CAPITAL BUZZ
REDIFF POLL
DEAR REDIFF
THE STATES
YEH HAI INDIA!
ARCHIVES

Sonia refuses to meet an ailing Kesri

Tara Shankar Sahay in New Delhi

It is perhaps an indication of the importance he enjoys within the Congress party, an outfit he headed till recently. Sitaram Kesri, who has been admitted in Ram Manohar Lohia hospital with a heart ailment for some time now, has had just one high profile visitor -- Arjun Singh -- so far. Sonia Gandhi, the Congress president who staged a coup of sorts against the 'old man in a hurry', has steadfastly stayed away from Kesri.

Highly-placed Congress officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, told this correspondent that the former party president was "in a bad shape due to several reasons". They said Kesri was being 'haunted' by several court cases, apart from a heart condition which has necessitated another bypass operation. Kesri, they said, had undergone bypass surgery in Houston some years ago. However, another bypass surgery entails huge expenses, which the former party chief is not in a position to meet.

Kesri has been placed in this precarious position because in one court case against him pertaining to FERA violations, he had gone on record that his monthly earning was a mere Rs 1,400. Since another bypass surgery would cost Kesri upwards of Rs 100,000, he is a worried man.

Kesri had sounded out the party leadership for financial assistance, but so far he appears to have drawn a blank.

His new station in life is nothing new. Since P V Narasimha Rao's tenure as Congress president, those who have relinquished the coveted office have been reduced to ordinary party members. In Kesri's case, the matter is all the more significant because even when urged by senior party colleagues he refused to step down as party president in Sonia's favouri. Eventually, the Congress Working Committee dethroned him and appointed Sonia in his place.

Tell us what you think of this report