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| Drubbed, marginalized Congress now confronts dissent from within | | | Kunal Shrivatsa
Early Times Report
JAMMU, Jan 16: Since its drubbing in the recently concluded Assembly polls in the state, the cracks in Pradesh Congress Committee are getting wider and prominent as the faction ridden state unit today once more displayed that something was seriously wrong within the party. If sources within Congress are to believed, the rift between the loyalists of both the Congress stalwarts viz former Chief Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad and PCC president Saif-ud-din Soz again came to fore when a meeting of membership drive panel called by membership drive chairman for Jammu province, former Minister Sham Lal Sharma, at party headquarters at Shaheedi Chowk here today washed out and turned out to be a flop show due to lack of quorum.
"Senior Congress leader Sham Lal Sharma, who is heading an 11-member membership drive panel for Jammu region, had convened a meeting of all district presidents to chalk out the ways and means to go about for the drive but astonishingly only five of them turned up for the meet… Nobody owing allegiance to Azad camp attended the meeting which clearly shows that party is certainly in dire straits," said sources.
"Adding insult to injury is the fact that out of the five district presidents, who attended the meeting, four of them including Pankaj Dogra (Kathua District), Shashi Sharma (Jammu District Rural) Shamsher Singh (Jammu District Rural) and Gurdarshan Singh (Jammu District Urban) are not full time presidents as they are acting only as working presidents. Only Prakash Sharma of District Samba is a full time president who was present in the meeting," they added
It was not only the Azad's loyalists who didn't come for the meeting but there are some district presidents including Ashok Gupta of District Udhampur, who is believed to be in Soz camp, preferred to stay away from the meeting.
"It is surprising that Ashok Gupta, who was handpicked by Soz to be appointed as district president of Udhampur with much fanfare just before the commencement of Assembly poll process in October last, was also conspicuous with his absence," said sources.
Sources further informed Early Times that the chairman of the committee Sham Lal Sharma on seeing that majority of district presidents have failed to ensure their presence for the meeting got annoyed.
"Main dekh loonga aur high command se shikayat karoonga (I will see and report the matter to the party High Command," sources quoting Sham Lal said.
Sources said that after today's meeting turned out to be damp squib, it was decided that district presidents in association with the block presidents would ensure that the membership drive is completed properly in Jammu region.
It is pertinent to mention here that some party leaders have sought the resignation PCC president Prof Saif-ud-din Soz on grounds of party's drubbing in the recently-concluded Assembly elections.
Among the 21 leaders, who attended the meeting where the joint statement was issued asking Soz to step down, are former Ministers Abdul Gani Vakil, Prem Sagar Aziz, Dr Manohar Lal, Yogesh Sawhney, Dr Ramesh Sharma, Haji Nisar Ali. This faction of party leaders, supposed to be close to former J&K Chief Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad, also criticized Soz for setting up two committees in the state for starting membership drive and demanded its dissolution. |
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