On UP and AP division?

Congress lays bare its  Shenanigans?

By Amba Charan Vashishth?

To charge politicians with “playing politics” is as juvenile as wondering why do human beings eat, drink and breathe. Politics is the very staple food, drink and breath of politicians. Yet, ironically, it is the politicians who charge each other — and not non-politicians — with “playing politics”, as if doing so is a crime heinous for politicians.

When Congress General Secretary Rahul Gandhi declared at Phulpur (UP) on November 14, 2011 that “UPites have been forced by failed governments to beg in Maharashtra” he was certainly not trifling with words, but fondly playing politics, pure and simple. When Opposition took umbrage at his words, it too was paying him in the same coin. Realising that Rahul words may boomerang on him personally and Congress politically, Congress spokesperson Abhishek Singhvi was quick to retort by charging Opposition with “playing politics at the use of a common idiom”.

When BJP National President Shri Nitin Gadkari, in the past, used common idioms and phrases to stress a political point, Congress did “play politics” by raising a great hue and cry against him and even demanded that the words be withdrawn. Now the Congress slip is showing, its hypocrisy and double standards getting exposed.

Recently, Congress accused UP Chief Minister Sushri Mayawati of “playing politics” for getting a resolution for bifurcating UP into four units passed in the State Assembly.

Only last year, the heir apparent was very selective in shedding a hundred tears at the pitiable condition of the people living not in the whole of UP but only in that of its part  known as Bundelkhand. On his great grandfather Jawaharlal Nehru’s birthday he — and not the inhabitants themselves — burst out in anger at the plight of UP people forced to beg in other states. That UP which includes the parliamentary constituencies of Rae Bareily, Amethi, Phulpur, etc. which had more or less been his own family’s fiefdoms — of his great grandfather,  grandmother, father, mother and his own for the last sixty years. By implication his Phulpur reference to “failed governments” obviously also includes Nehru-Gandhi Congress governments which ruled UP and the Centre for more than 40 years.

Only last year Rahul Gandhi had cried aghast at the condition of Bundelkhand. On Rahul’s recommendation the Prime Minister granted a 1,800 crore package not for UP but only for its part known as Bundelkhand. Rahul’s championing the Bundelkhand cause indirectly amounted to support for carving out of a new state. But now when Sushri Mayawati calls for division of UP into four states, including Bundelkhand, to Congress it is ignoble “playing politics”.

In the 2004 Congress election manifesto Congress had promised creation of a separate Telangana state out of Andhra Pradesh. After winning election, it forgot its solemn pledge. But when Telugu Rashtriya Samiti (TRS) chief Chandrashekhar Rao went on fast, on December 9, 2009 Home Minister P Chidambaram announced: “The process of forming the state of Telangana will be initiated. An appropriate resolution will be moved in the state assembly.”  Yet, this has not so far happened. Since then Manmohan government has only been playing hide and seek with the people. TRS chief quit Union Cabinet; he and some of his colleagues resigned from Lok Sabha; won by-elections again on Telangana issue; numerous Congress Ministers and MLAs have resigned from the Assembly and the party in protest and the State is in turmoil for the last so many months.

Events after the December 2009 official announcement only divest Congress intentions of the element of honesty and sincerity of purpose. If it does not amount to “playing politics”, what else does it? Congress seems to be behaving as if it has the exclusive patent on “playing politics”, on not meaning what it says and vice versa, on adopting double standards and, above all, has the unchallengeable right to hypocrisy.