Congress Nagar: Over 20,000 Congressmen coming together to celebrate the grand old party, the Indian National Congress completing 125 years of an eventful existence. But the mood at the 83rd Congress plenary, held with all the pomp and show in a grand tent, did not reflect the grandness of the occasion.
The mood was somber to start with -- the party delegates sat quietly neither cheering nor shouting slogans as they normally do asking for Rahul Gandhi to speak.
It was a reflection of the problems being faced by the party outside Burari, where the session was being held.
The showstoppers -- Sonia and Rahul Gandhi -- spoke during the day but it was the protest over Bihar, which really stole the show. During a lull in the proceedings when the mike connection went off, a group of delegates got up and began shouting, resulting in the proceedings being disrupted.
The Bihar uprising
Bihar marred the mood of the plenary. The issue of corruption, which was the issue of the day, had come home to hit the Congress hard with party insiders and All India Congress Committee members objecting to the corruption within the Congress, which led to tickets being sold in Bihar and the subsequent defeat of the party.
The anger was directed against Mukul Wasnik, the AICC general secretary in-charge of Bihar, who has been blamed for the selling of the tickets.
"Mukul Wasnik ko manch se utaaro, Mukul Wasnik chor hai (Bring down Mukul Wasnik from the dais, he is a thief)", was the slogan being shouted.
Leaders came down from the dais and tried to intervene, the electronic media suddenly had a story in the midst of a dull day. Finally, they were persuaded to leave but the bytes continued outside.
The pent-up frustration against Wasnik had been building up since the Bihar election results.
A large number of delegates were stopped from coming to the session, but later they were allowed to come. AICC member Urmila Singh said that tickets had been sold in Bihar with loyal party workers being ignored and outsiders and anti-social elements were given tickets. The party got 4 seats in a house of 243.
The maximum clapping for both Sonia and Rahul Gandhi came when they asked ministers and chief ministers to spend time in meeting and listen to party workers. She said the party had been cut off from the workers and the workers were feeling neglected and left out.
Interestingly, Rahul also made the same point almost as though he were directing the ministers seated on the dais and in the front row to spend some time for the workers. The remarks were greeted with huge clapping.
Rahul's speech was almost like the young leader coming of age. He gave a speech on the broad contours of development, on the need to make the aam admi a part of the system, on the issues of corruption, on the need to connect with the workers and the grass root karyakartas, on the need to give equal opportunities to the poor and the aam admi.
His speech in many ways complimented that of his mother and with the House listening in rapt attention, it looked as though he was ready to move on from the youth Congress onto the mainstream party platform.
When nobody clapped
In view of the thrashing the party has been receiving, Sonia Gandhi spent a fair amount of time tackling the issue of corruption and suggesting various solutions, which can help in tackling this.
She said that ministers and chief ministers should give up the power for discretionary land allotment and quotas, which was the fountainhead of corruption. After a moment when there was no clapping she said: "I see none of you has clapped after this suggestion."
The leadership also appears to have realised the need for a long overdue brain storming session along the lines of Panchmarhi and Shimla with the Congress president suggesting that this would be organised soon to discuss various issues.
Support for the PMShe spent a moment praising the leadership of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and while deriding the BJP's criticism of the PM, she said the party was solidly behind him.
Leaders from west Bengal and Tamil Nadu expressed unhappiness over the alliance saying that any alliance should not be at the cost of the party's self respect and should be with dignity and this is non-negotiable.
The hit was directed against Mamata Banerjee who, they said, was critical of the party in West Bengal and did not even invite local MPs to functions where she was present.
But one of the best and most hard-hitting speeches came from AICC general secretary Digvijaya Singh, who was one of the only leaders to forcefully and forcibly attack the BJP-RSS and the mindset of the Sangh Parivar.
He said they had infiltrated all aspects of life and described the Babri Masjid demolition as the biggest blot on the nation. He asked the home minister to enquire into the activities of the RSS and other such organizations and said that all the terrorist attacks by Hindus were from those who belonged to the RSS and its affiliates.
Digvijaya Singh said that later prime minister Rajiv Gandhi had picked up leaders like him, Ahmed Patel, Gulam Nabi Azad and many others and made them PCC presidents at a young age as well as given them other posts.
He said that now that their expiry date was nearing, Rahul should do the same and bring in young leaders to man key posts in the organization. He said it was time for the youth to come forward and take over the reigns.
