New Delhi: What's wrong if detractors mock the grand old Congress? It's the good old story of a good mother and her son!
The Congress Working Committee (CWC) finally met in Delhi on Saturday with Sonia Gandhi asserting that she is the 'full-time' president and the panel members dutifully appealed to Rahul Gandhi to take 'back' the charge of Congress party.
Of course, two years plus is a longtime and most Congress wise men and women – barring the 23 rebels probably – forgot that in effect Rahul had resigned taking 'moral responsibility' for the 2019 poll debacle. Now what has changed since then, except that Congress failed to return to power in Kerala and Assam and scored 'zero' in tango with the communists in West Bengal ?
“I have always appreciated frankness. There is no need to speak to me through the media. So let us all have a free and honest discussion. But what should get communicated outside the four walls of this room is the collective decision of the CWC," Sonia blasts the likes of Kapil Sibal.
The BJP got a reason to mock in the first place; and secondly in a humorous and sarcastic sense, some Twitteratis say Narendra Modi is 'again lucky' for the big battle of 2024.
Congress under Rahul Gandhi's stewardship lost two polls to Modi – 2014 and 2019, and on both the occasions, Congress tally was less than one-tenth of the strength of Lok Sabha.
"They (CWC) will not have courage to call spade a spade because it does not suit their political narrative," remarked BJP spokesman Gaurav Bhatia in reference CWC conduct as they forgot to mention the Singhu dastardly attack allegedly by Nhang Sikhs. Bhatia made use of his media briefing and called the CWC – the 'Parivar bachao Working Committee'.
On the other hand, Sonia Gandhi has sought to silence the detractors of G-23 and targeted thel ikes of Kapil Sibal specially. “I am, if you will allow me to say so, a full-time and hands-on Congress President," she asserted in reference to what Sibal had suggested a few days back that in the event of an 'interim president' in the party, perhaps no one was sure who was taking the key political decisions like the Congress moves in Punjab.
Sonia also said endorsing her children Rahul-Pariyanka duo taking to streets and maintained while the younger colleagues have taken “leadership roles”, the senior ones were busy giving sound bytes and media interviews. An old family loyalist and former Union Minister Kapil Sibal (remember his 'zero loss' theory about 2G spectrum scam) has raised a banner of revolt and stated: "We cannot be doing Jee-Huzuris'.
As expected, the 'first family' was shocked and there was an 'orchestrated' tomato-protest near Sibal's house.
Even P Chidambaram and Ghulam Nabi Azad also slammed such protests and intolerance to criticism.
But at the Congress Working Committee (CWC) meeting, the tunes changed drastically. It was Congress that spoke about 'democratic principles'. The fact of the matter is in Punjab,the Congress has a 'black law' against farmers and also Rahul Gandhi's own colleagues have questioned the absence of inner party democracy in the grand old opposition party. BJP spokesman Gaurav Bhatia also said the Congress again advanced the 'politics of lies'. Bhatia cited the police lathi-charge on a group of protesting farmers in the Congress-ruled states of Punjab and Rajasthan and also noted that a law on contract farming brought in by Punjab says that farmers can be arrested for breaking the agreement.
"This is what a black law is," he emphasised and called for withdrawal of such a law. Bhatia also said the Congress party in their memorandum to President Ram Nath Kovind has claimed (falsely) that no FIR was lodged for Lakhimpur episode.
Oh Vaccines, my Vaccines:
The BJP spokesperson also took a dig at Sonia Gandhi for the part of her statement in which she is noting that all CWC are now doubly vaccinated, paving the way for its first physical meeting.
The BJP leader pointed out that the opposition party had earlier resorted to criticism of the Modi government’s vaccination policies.
The Congress should offer words of thanks to scientists and doctors when 100 crore doses of vaccines are completed in a few days, he said.
Mr Bhatia also criticised Sonia Gandhi for not visiting her Lok Sabha constituency of Rai Bareli for over 21 months and said this reflected a failure of an elected lawmaker.
