IT is a time of reckoning. In the last parliamentary elections, the Congress had won just one of the 54 Lok Sabha seatsin Bihar. In April this year, it suffered the ignominy of losing the status of being the main opposition party in the state to the Bharatiya Janata Party. Its strength was down to 29 from 72 in the 324-member state legislative assembly as Laloo Prasad Yadav formed the government for the sec-ond consecutive term. But the worst, it seems, is yet to come.
The crisis looms large as the dissidents led by AICC minority cell Chairman Tariq Anwar have given an ultimatum to party chief, Prime Minister P.V. Narasimha Rao, to remove Jagannath Mishra from the Union Cabinet and replace PCC chief Sarfraz Ahmed, holding them both guilty for the current state of affairs within the party. In the absence of a positive response by December 28, the dissidents plan to hold a "Congress Maha Panchayat" to chart out their future course—which in all eventuality might lead to a split.
"The party is going to draw a blank in the coming parliamentary elections if the change is not brought about immediately," says Anwar ( see box ). His followers go to the extent of calling Mishra a "Tankhaiya", implying he is out to destroy the Congress from within and demand that he be barred from holding any position, eitherin the party or the Government, for at least 12 years.
Sarfraz Ahmed, a Mishra protege, promptly recommended Anwar's expulsion from the party to the AICC. "We are assessing the situation," say sources close to S.K. Sindhe, Bihar AICC general secretary. Sindhe himself is supposed to be in favour of Anwar's expulsion but Rao is opposed to such an act in the electionyear. The fear is that his expulsion could send a wrong signal to the minorities who the Congress is so desperately trying to woo as the elections approach. Out of the five ministers from Bihar at the Centre, only Mishra has come out openly for action. Krishna Sahi supports Anwar. The others, Sitaram Kesri, Ram Lakhan Singh Yadav and S.S. Ahluwalia, have remained neutral so far.
Anwar, incidentally, has also set the cat among the pigeons by taking a position against Union Home Minister S.B. Chavan—who is number two in the Rao cabinet—for his participation in Shiv Sena functions and repeatedly opposing demands for apologising to the Muslims for the demolition of the Babri Masjid. The move has brought him closer to Sharad Pawar and helped provide a national canvas for what otherwise would have been a localised revolt within the Bihar unit of the party.
"Anwar is also working at the behest of 10 Janpath, obviously to foil Rao's move to cultivate minorities," says a senior party functionary. But going by Rao's track record, it is unlikely that he will concede to Anwar's demand within the deadline and will rather pave the way for another exodus. Like in Uttar Pradesh, the Bihar unit of the Congress seems headed for a truncated existence with little hope for revival in the near future.
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