Last August, when
speculation mounted over I.K. Gujral's future, Congress President Sitaram Kesri announced
with characteristic flamboyance that not only would the prime minister preside over this
Independence Day celebrations, he would be there for two more. To be fair, Kesri would
have loved to stick to his commitment. Unlike H.D. Deve Gowda, whom he instinctively
distrusted, Kesri hit it off famously with Gujral. He would even have countenanced a
future arrangement in which the Congress participated in a Gujral-led government.
Unfortunately, Kesri is no longer his own master. Cornered by his factional adversaries
into demanding the heads of the DMK ministers on a platter, the Congress president has
tried his best to find a face-saving formula that can avert a mid-term election. He has
blown hot with the Sonia loyalists, even going to the extent of demanding V.P. Singh's
punishment, but has then quietly tried to defuse the situation. If it hadn't been for the
CWC's public demand for the outright exclusion of the DMK from the UF Government, he may
well have succeeded. He tried to put off the formal withdrawal of support as long as
possible, thereby making the party an object of ridicule and dissipating the Congress'
emotional euphoria over the Jain report. Subsequently, when there appeared a real risk of
Congress MPs going their own way, he offered the bait of life in this Parliament after
Gujral. It brought back the deviants, but it reaffirmed Kesri's reputation as a
duplicitous snake -- an image which served him well as party treasurer but which the
president of the Congress cannot afford
Last August, when
speculation mounted over I.K. Gujral's future, Congress President Sitaram Kesri announced
with characteristic flamboyance that not only would the prime minister preside over this
Independence Day celebrations, he would be there for two more. To be fair, Kesri would
have loved to stick to his commitment. Unlike H.D. Deve Gowda, whom he instinctively
distrusted, Kesri hit it off famously with Gujral. He would even have countenanced a
future arrangement in which the Congress participated in a Gujral-led government.
Unfortunately, Kesri is no longer his own master. Cornered by his factional adversaries
into demanding the heads of the DMK ministers on a platter, the Congress president has
tried his best to find a face-saving formula that can avert a mid-term election. He has
blown hot with the Sonia loyalists, even going to the extent of demanding V.P. Singh's
punishment, but has then quietly tried to defuse the situation. If it hadn't been for the
CWC's public demand for the outright exclusion of the DMK from the UF Government, he may
well have succeeded. He tried to put off the formal withdrawal of support as long as
possible, thereby making the party an object of ridicule and dissipating the Congress'
emotional euphoria over the Jain report. Subsequently, when there appeared a real risk of
Congress MPs going their own way, he offered the bait of life in this Parliament after
Gujral. It brought back the deviants, but it reaffirmed Kesri's reputation as a
duplicitous snake -- an image which served him well as party treasurer but which the
president of the Congress cannot afford
