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Sonia urged to take action against Pawar

Angry followers of Congress president Sonia Gandhi have urged her to initiate prompt action against senior party leader and leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha Sharad Pawar who had said that pulling down the Bharatiya Janata Party-led led government at this juncture would lead to instability in the country.

Pawar's controversial statement, made in a television interview, has stirred a hornet's nest in the party with Congressmen demanding that the Maratha strongman be served a show-cause notice for speaking out of turn on crucial policy matters.

Pawar had said the time was not ripe to pull down the Atal Bihari Vajpayee government since it could lead to instability.

The Congressmen, urging Sonia to initiate disciplinary action against Pawar, feel he had added insult to injury by making such statements.

Senior party leader Rajesh Pilot pointed out, ''If Congress leaders begin to give their views on party matters, it becomes a pain in the neck for the leadership.''

He said that a person of Pawar's stature should have realised that only Sonia could make statements on policy matters. He also maintained that the least Pawar could have done was to check with the party president whether he could make his views known on such crucial matters.

The Congressmen's pique at Pawar stems from the fact that controversial Janata Party president Dr Subramanian Swamy had a secret meeting with the Congress chief on Monday.

During the meeting, Dr Swamy urged Sonia to pull down the government before August 15 so that Vajpayee could not hoist the national tricolour from the ramparts of the Red Fort on Independence day.

According to a report, Sonia listened patiently to Dr Swamy's pleadings to pull down the Vajpayee government and indicated that the matter was being considered by her party.

However, when asked whether Dr Swamy had urged Sonia to pull down the Vajpayee government before August 15, Congress general secretary Oscar Fernandes said he was unaware of any such meeting.

His party colleague and Congress spokesman Ajit Jogi maintained that he could not confirm whether the meeting had been held.

Party officials said Pawar would find it difficult to explain his statement with his detractors accusing him of being in league with some leaders of the ruling party.

Thus, the party chief has no option but to take grave exception to the Maratha strongman's latest indiscretion, a leader pointed out.

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