For Sonia, He Is A Nobody

HE may have been a colleague of Rajiv Gandhi from his Indian Airlines days, but Satish Sharma has run out of favour with Sonia Gandhi. According to very reliable sources in the Congress, there is no move from 10, Janpath to rescue the former Union petroleum minister, whose deals are being investigated by the CBI. In fact, there is little sympathy for Sharma even within his party. And in the absence of any indication from Rajiv Gandhi’s widow that he must be helped, the former minister may well have to fight a lone legal battle.

Sharma, say sources in the Congress, is seen as a turncoat by Sonia Gandhi loyalists since he did very little for the family after Rajiv’s death. As a minister under Narasimha Rao, Satish Sharma was among those often summoned to 5, Race Course Road, the guest house in the former prime minister’s residence, which is alleged to have been the hub where many deals were struck.

The upshot, which Sonia loyalists are using to explain her apathy towards the captain, is: more than a friend of the Gandhi family, Sharma was Rao’s man. For some strange reason, he was not particularly perturbed by the slow pace of the Verma Commission and took very little interest in the investigations into the Rajiv Gandhi assassination. "No friend of Rajiv Gandhi or a supporter of Soniaji would have stayed aloof as he did," says a Congress leader.

Also, Sonia was not happy with the manner in which her late husband’s colleague was looking after Amethi. Indeed, on one occasion when people from the constituency did meet her, she openly agreed with them that Sharma was doing little for his constituency. The people of Amethi saw him as too arrogant a man to be a successful politician. This is a view shared by many Congressmen who feel Sharma needs to be investigated and exposed.