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| Congressmen taking on Taj indicative of cleansing process in party | | AFSPA & Rotational CM | | Neha
JAMMU, Oct 30: PHE minister Taj Mhi-ud-Din was destined to face heat and criticism for his seemingly pro-CM Omar Abdullah views and it has actually happened, though belated. The patience of the Congressmen, including ministers and JKPCC functionaries finally ended yesterday and they virtually asked Taj to quit the party as he clearly appeared to be a NC man in the Congress party. Significantly, it was a full-scale attack on Taj and those who castigated him belonged to both the provinces, Jammu and Kashmir. It could be construed as one more significant development in the Congress party, which has of late started asserting and put the NC leadership on the mat.
The immediate provocations behind what the local Congress leadership did yesterday were three. One, Taj had publicly contradicted the JKPCC chief Prof Saif-ud-Din's well-considered and rational and national stand on the AFSPA saying it was wrong to say that the chief minister had not consulted the Congress. The chief minister had consulted him, Taj had said at least three times during the last few days. Of course, he also said that the time was not yet ripe for the revocation of the AFSPA even from certain selected areas but it was already too late in the sense that he had never ever suggested that he had opposed the chief minister's move on the AFSPA. His statements on the AFSPA had, on the contrary, left none in any doubt that he and the chief minister and the NC were on the same page and that he didn't share the views of Prof Soz, thus lowering the image and position of the JKPCC president in the eyes of the NC and the people.
Two, Taj publicly humbled Prof Soz by asserting that Omar Abdullah would continue to rule the state for a full term of six years as, according to him, the matter was clinched in 2009 itself. Taj had said on Saturday that he was in touch with the Congress high command and that he could vouch for the fact that Omar Abdullah would lead the government for another three years. Prof Soz's consistent stand was that it was for the Congress high command to take a final decision on the issue. Even Congress general secretary Rahul Gandhi (read high command) had taken the similar line when he visited Jammu and Kashmir in the last week of September this year. Rahul had then faced the Congress workers' wrath both in Srinagar and Jammu, all protagonists of rotational chief minister.
Three, Taj created on Saturday an impression that he knew more than what Prof Soz knew and the issue again was the rotational chief minister. He behaved in a fashion which led everyone to believe that it was Taj who alone could play the shots in the party and determine the nature of ties between the NC and the Congress. He, in fact, sought to create an impression that Taj was Congress and Congress was Taj and that all others in the party, including the JKPCC president and ministers, were there only to follow him.
Taj had become so outspoken and vocal that he would most of the time try to project himself as someone in the party who enjoyed veto power. He became vocal, particularly after June 2010, when a powerful section of the local Congress leadership and Congress workers operating at the grass-roots level raised the pitch and suggested that Omar Abdullah should not be allowed to continue after January 4, 2012, when he would complete three years as chief minister. Their view was that the continuation of Omar Abdullah beyond a period of three years would not be in the larger interest of the party. Their grievances were many. Two of them were (I) the chief minister and the NC ministers had consistently ignored them and (2) the chief minister, the NC ministers and the NC leadership had been systematically expanding their support-base at the cost of the Congress party. Yet another argument the votaries of rotational chief minister had advanced was that the chief minister and the NC ministers were ignoring the Congress constituency in the state and that they had been behaving like the dictators behave.
The moral of the story is that Taj today stands totally exposed and thoroughly isolated. Another moral of the story is that the difficulties of the already beleaguered and cornered chief minister Omar Abdullah are multiplying by the day. It is now extremely difficult to say if Omar Abdullah would be able even to complete three years in office. Anything can happen anytime. There is the possibility of the NC quitting the government. There is also the possibility of the Congress asking the NC to wind up. Things have climaxed to this point. |
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