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Floating A Trial Balloon

Scindia has his eyes set on number two slot in the party and his graph is only rising

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Floating A Trial Balloon
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Who is the number two in the Congress? Or, more appropriately, who is gunning for the all-important second spot in the party after Sonia Gandhi? Why, Madhavrao Scindia of course. A nine-time MP, scion of the Gwalior political 'gharana' and an old Gandhi family loyalist, surely Scindia's graph is on the rise. But the point is, in a party plagued by open internal differences and many runners for the second spot, can he make it to the finish line?

Party leaders say his big break came when Sonia appointed him the deputy leader of the Congress in the Lok Sabha. Technically, it puts him in the number two slot, at least in the Lok Sabha. Although in real terms it may not mean much, in a party whose leader is yet to make a mark in the rough and tumble of parliamentary din—not to mention the subtle change of nuances and quick backtracking by hardened politicians—the 'deputy' is trying hard to consolidate on this. Insiders say all parliamentary decisions are routed through Scindia, reportedly on the latter's instructions. Of late, he has also ensured that he's not just limited to the Lok Sabha, but all important proposals, read decisions, of the party are routed through him.

It follows a pattern. In the Lok Sabha, Scindia led the attack on the government on the wto issue, conveniently forgetting that it was his party that had signed the agreement when in power. He has also been Sonia's principal advisor on Gujarat, Maharashtra and Rajasthan. Although his role in Maharashtra, where he cleverly adopted the Maratha mantle to take on Sharad Pawar, did not quite pay off, he managed to salvage some pride when Vilasrao Deshmukh was made the chief minister. He played a major role in bringing together Ahmed Patel and Madhavsinh Solanki in Gujarat. He's the principal architect of the party's farm policy. He was instrumental in the appointment of a little-known S. Jaiswal as UP Congress chief but could do little when Ajit Jogi was sworn in chief minister of Chattisgarh instead of his favourite Mahendra Karma, the only man, other than Scindia himself, to win an election under the aegis of the MP Vikas Parishad. Last week, he was appointed the head of a delegation to meet visiting Chinese leader Li Peng. He is now doing some intense homework on the disinvestment issue.

But he has consciously steered clear of the Ayodhya issue. Reason: his critics say he does not want to offend the bjp, given the clout his rivals enjoy in his constituency. They refer to the 1996 election, when a strong bjp candidate from Gwalior pulled out at the last minute to facilitate Scindia's victory. The other reason: his mother, Vijayaraje Scindia, is a prominent bjp leader from Madhya Pradesh.

Sources say that serious differences emerged within the party ranks when the Ayodhya issue cropped up during the last winter session of Parliament. Scindia's main rivals—reportedly led by Arjun Singh and comprising other leaders from a state which also has the largest number of disgruntled heavyweight Congressmen—impressed upon the party leadership that Scindia had deliberately left the Ayodhya plank unattended because he secretly wanted to embarrass Sonia. "The whole thing was engineered in such a way so that the Congress was not left with any option—it had no leg to stand on Ayodhya," says one party insider.

This could be one of the reasons why Sonia Gandhi decided against holding elections in the cwc and instead went for nominations for all the 24 positions. What followed was a record of sorts—aicc members resigned en masse, abdicating their right to elect members of the cwc. This was indeed a setback to Scindia's hopes of winning by a huge margin, and thus getting him streets ahead of his rivals. Many still believe that elections to the cwc would have propped up a number two in the party. This, they say, could eventually prove problematic for Sonia Gandhi.

In normal circumstances, polling the highest number of votes in a cwc election is not enough to be billed as a successor to the leader. It did not happen in Calcutta in 1996 when Ahmed Patel accounted for the highest number of votes. But it was different in Tirupati. There was panic in the party ranks when Arjun Singh and Sharad Pawar formed a joint panel and polled the largest number of votes. Things were normalised only after former prime minister P.V. Narasimha Rao stepped in and asked the two to resign to make way for women and minorities. Although both Singh and Pawar were brought back in the nominated category eventually, the sheen from their victory was naturally lost. These permutations and combinations notwithstanding, the long-awaited cwc list, expected to be announced this week, promises to have some prominent Scindia nominees, including the man himself from Madhya Pradesh.

But this certainly does not mean that Scindia will have a cakewalk to the cwc. Before that, he'll have to battle the forces within the party working against him. In Congress's parlour politics, the coterie plays an important role. At one level is the 'political' coterie—which includes Gandhi-Nehru loyalists in which Scindia figures at the top. Others in this group include archrival Arjun Singh, Motilal Vora, Ghulam Nabi Azad and others. The second cabal includes politicians who are basically non-political—Oscar Fernandes, Ahmed Patel, who is about to be resurrected in the cwc, Makhanlal Fotedar, V. George and R.K. Dhawan, who sources say, has reportedly fallen out of favour. But Scindia's tensions

stem from the fact that a number of important figures from both the camps, including the influential Vincent George and old loyalist Fotedar, are not too fond of him.



In today's context, a potential number two is important. And an ambitious politician like Scindia is aware of it. In the event of the Vajpayee government falling, caught in the crossfire between the contradictions of Sangh parivar politics and the compulsions of the nda, a Congress number two wields a lot of power. Party leaders argue that while Sonia's candidature is certainly not going to be supported by a number of parties like the Samajwadi Party and other Third Front luminaries, it would be better to back Scindia. Party MPs are reportedly not in favour of going for another elections, should something happen to the Vajpayee government. And in that scheme of things, Scindia would stand more than a good chance.

Sources close to Scindia say his equation with the new 'Mrs G' is near perfect. Unlike others in the party, he does not address her as 'madam', their acquaintance not going back to England as is assumed, but to the time when Rajiv Gandhi was being inducted into politics. His supporters say that he enjoys many other advantages over his rivals—he's got a clean image, he does not attend the 'durbar' at 10 Janpath and that he never gives suggestions, until asked for.

Some MP politicians say that his ambitions are limitless and that he's aiming big. According to Congress circles, he has a finger in every pie—the Chinese whisper doing the rounds points to a rapprochement within the Scindia clan, which has resulted in a settlement over the fabulous Scindia Villa in downtown Delhi in conjunction with Brajesh Mishra—between them, they are more than keen to move J.K. Jain and his television company out of its premises.

He is also expected to be one of the prime movers at the aicc plenary session, scheduled to be held in Bangalore in the second week of February. He is said to be emphasising that the economic content of the nda government's plans be subjected to an intense critique.

A quick-thinking Scindia also played an important role in deciding the venue, keeping in view that the next round of assembly elections this year would be held in three southern states—Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Pondicherry. Clearly, Scindia's graph is on the rise and the cwc list could only make his case stronger.

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