AS Congress stalwart Arjun Singh made a tearful affirmation of loyalty towards the Nehru-Gandhi clan during a function at 10, Janpath last fortnight, his detractors were quick to draw a parallel with the crocodile that sheds tears while devouring its prey. They saw it as a sign of the leader reaching back for his old bag of manipulative tricks after being sidelined for urging Congress president Sonia Gandhi into a series of political gaffes.
His strategy is simple: to get a grip over the party's electoral college, the aicc, by using Sonia's private secretary Vincent George to get his own men - members of the erstwhile Congress(T) - appointed as returning officers and pcc chiefs.
Curiously, the party appears impervious to the fact that this palace intrigue is being conducted against the background of an alarmingly attenuated mass base. When Sonia took over the reins of the Congress in 1998, enrolment figures stood at 4.58 crore. After the just-concluded membership drive, it's 2.19 crore, with results from six states yet to come in but unlikely to cross the 3-crore mark.
So, while the party prepares to elect its leaders, there's been no introspection on what they can deliver. Says political scientist D.L. Sheth: "There's a basic mismatch between the nature of the Congress leadership, which enjoys a post-colonial aristocratic image, and its pro-poor rhetoric."
The Singh-George duo is determined to maintain a hold on the party. They are perpetuating what Sheth calls the "deputy syndrome" - the top party post is reserved for the big white chief/scion of the dynasty and other leaders can only hope for the number two slot.
So, Sonia is assured of election as party president by the tina factor, regardless of the party's diminishing influence. Members of the coterie, of course, have no intention of facing elections at all. Both Arjun Singh and Natwar Singh have already announced that they will not contest the cwc elections. Both have made it clear that they would prefer nomination to the apex body.
Shaken by the fact that palace nominees either lost or barely won in the Congress Parliamentary Party elections, the duo is not taking chances. The tussle at the top has resulted in rival factions, sponsored by different leaders, in each state. Observes a cwc member: "It's not loyalist against loyalist. It's Congress(T) against Congress." In Punjab, for instance, loyalist and pcc chief Amarinder Singh faces a challenge from MP Jagmeet Brar (formerly of the Congress-T). Likewise, in Haryana, pcc president Bhupinder Singh Hooda must contend with Rao Inderjit (from the Congress-T). And in Uttar Pradesh, upcc chief Salman Khursheed was replaced by another former Congress(T) man, Sri Prakash Jaiswal.
THE winnowing has not been just at the state level. One by one, party leaders who might have enjoyed a say have been marginalised. The axe fell first on Ahmed Patel, former party treasurer and perhaps the most popular man in the organisation. His perceived proximity to Sonia (who'd made him her political secretary) proved his undoing. He was recently forced out of 10, Janpath and back to Gujarat.
The next to go was Pranab Mukherjee. As chief strategist and head of several important policy-making panels, he was influential. Deft manipulations by MP Kamal Nath (currently aligned with Arjun Singh) sent Mukherjee off to West Bengal as its pcc chief, a post from which A.B.A. Ghani Khan Choudhary had been ousted.
Most significant of all, perhaps, has been the steady marginalisation of Manmohan Singh, once a candidate for prime minister and now - according to sources close to him - on the verge of quitting politics. The former finance minister has made no secret of his disgust with the way the party has been functioning; he publicly declined to head the Congress economic review panel. His exit would mean that Arjun Singh could lead the party in the Rajya Sabha.
Of late, Congress leaders have taken to looking over their shoulders. cwc member Ambika Soni, who enjoys the confidence of the Congress president, could well be the next target. Chief minister Shiela Dixit, at cross-purposes with George, is a target despite her Congress(T) background.
Both Digvijay Singh and A.K. Antony, mass-based leaders who are popular in the party, have gone out of their way to reassure Sonia and the coterie that they are not a threat to her leadership. Antony can't be touched before the Kerala elections, but both Arjun Singh and Kamal Nath would be happy to oust Digvijay Singh. Already, the idea of "maximising his talents" by bringing him to the Centre - the language used in Khursheed's case - has been mooted. When pilloried with allegations of trying to hijack the party elections, Arjun Singh said he was the victim of a media conspiracy.
The appointment of Jaiswal is significant in that UP controls 20 per cent of the party's electoral college. Partymen believe Arjun Singh had that in mind when he convinced Sonia that the best way to spike the dissidents' guns was to get rid of Khursheed. cwc member Jitendra Prasada, having taken over the mantle of the chief dissident with the demise of Rajesh Pilot, was targeting Sonia through Khursheed, he pointed out. Sonia eventually succumbed.
An unexpected fallout of the machinations has been a widespread impression that minorities in the Congress are not getting their due, with Patel, Ghani Khan Choudhary and Khursheed having been ousted. Last week's attempt to reverse this impression by inducting a so-called Shahi Imam of Patna into the party cut no ice."The Congress has never played the caste or community card," protests Arjun Singh. But it will surely need to play a couple of aces in order to revive its sagging image.
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