It comes after key leaders of Kerala quit party ahead of Assembly polls
In a major blow to the Congress in poll-bound Kerala, senior leader PC Chacko on Wednesday resigned from the party alleging group interest in deciding party candidates for the coming Assembly elections. Chacko also alleged the national leadership of the party has not been active for the last two years.
He, however, did not announce his future plans but made it clear on his views on the BJP, saying the saffron party “is not a political factor” in the southern States.
Chacko’s resignation comes at the backdrop of prominent leaders of State unit quitting the grand old party in Kerala ahead of the Assembly polls where the Congress pinned hopes. Most significantly resignations of MLAs falling within the Parliamentary constituency of former party chief Rahul Gandhi has brought worries for the Congress. Assembly polls in Kerala will he held on April 6 and results will be declared on May 2.
Former Kerala Congress Committee member KK Vishwanathan, KPCC secretary MS Vishwanathan, DCC general secretary PK Anil Kumar and Mahila Congress leader Sujaya Venugopal resigned from the party within a week and all held posts in Wayanad represented by Rahul Gandhi in the Lok Sabha. While MS Vishwanathan said he was resigning from the party due to failure of the Congress leadership in the district and neglect by the KPCC leadership, KK Vishwanathan alleged that the party was being run by a three-member team in Wayanad.
Chacko, who was a former working committee member of the Congress, is the second senior leader to quit the grand old party after Jyotiraditya Scindia. Scindia joined the BJP after his resignation over differences with Congress’ Madhya Pradesh State leadership and is now a Rajya Sabha member.
Amid demand from a group of 23 senior Congress leaders for an organisational overhaul of the party, Chacko, who once headed the Joint Parliamentary Committee on 2G Spectrum during the second UPA rule, has alleged party leadership has been defunct for the last couple of years. He also alleged undemocratic ways in selection of candidates for the Kerala Assembly polls.
Referring to the period of vacuum created in the party’s national leadership after Rahul Gandhi quit the post of Congress president following the party’s defeat in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, Chacko said, “the Congress had been headless for the last one-and-a-half years”.
“There was no one in the party at the national level recalling the situation that forced Sonia Gandhi, who is facing health issues, to take leadership of the party,” he said.
“I have sent my resignation letter to Congress president (Sonia Gandhi) and to Rahul Gandhi. This decision, I have been deliberating for the last many days,” said Chacko at a Press conference in the national Capital.
“No democracy left in the Congress. Candidate list has not been discussed with the State Congress committee,” he further alleged.
Hitting out at the leadership of the two groups in Kerala’s Congress party — “A” group headed by former Chief Minister Oommen Chandy and “I” group led by senior party leader Ramesh Chennithala — Chacko alleged that only Chandy and Chennithala know who all are being fielded as the party’s candidates in April 6 Kerala Assembly polls.
Reacting to Chacko’s allegations, another senior Congress leader Anand Sharma said there are no groups in the Congress and it stands united in the fight against the BJP and other opponents in the upcoming Assembly polls in four States and a Union Territory, Sharma, a prominent member of the “Group of 23” leaders who wrote to Congress chief Sonia Gandhi demanding an organisational overhaul, said there should be no wrong impression about groupism in the party.
“There are no two groups. It is one Congress and the president is Sonia Gandhi. Right now, the only objective before the party is to fight the elections together to defeat the BJP and other opponents,” Sharma said a Press conference.
“Let there be no wrong impression that the Congress will not fight these battles together,” the former Union Minister said when asked about Chacko quitting the Congress ahead of the Kerala Assembly polls and groupism growing in the party.
Leader of Opposition in the Rajya Sabha Mallikarjun Kharge preferred not to answer the question, saying he will do so at the right time. Sharma said the Congress has historically stood for internal discussions, where issues are debated within the organisation. “In the long history of the INC from the days of the freedom struggle, when Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru Vallabhbhai Patel, Subhas Chandra Bose were there, the tradition has continued,” he noted.
Thursday, 11 March 2021 | PNS | New Delhi/Kochi
