“The structure of our party has collapsed,” said Congress leader Ghulam Nabi Azad.
New Delhi:
Congressional top leader Ghulam Nabi Azad, one of the original 23 dissidents whose letter created a storm in Congress, today appeared to blow holes in his fellow dissident Kapil Sibal’s comments on the party’s leadership.
“The structure of our party has collapsed. We need to rebuild our structure and then if any leader is elected in that structure, it will work,” Azad said in an interview with the ANI news agency.
Then came the reply.
“But to say that just by changing the leader, we will win Bihar, UP, Madhya Pradesh, etc. is wrong. That will happen once we change the system,” he added.
Talking to The Indian Express After the Bihar elections, where Congress has been the weakest link in the opposition alliance, Sibal had criticized the party leadership.
Noting a series of setbacks in states such as Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh, where the party presence is strong, Sibal had advised Congress to “recognize that we are in decline” and that it was essential to talk to “experienced minds … people who understand the Political Realities of India “.
In the same interview, he had also mentioned that he had been forced to make his views public because “there has been no dialogue and there does not seem to be any effort to dialogue by the management.”
Together, the comments were viewed as critical of the Gandhi’s political understanding and leadership style and had irritated a large portion of the Gandhi family loyalists and veterans.
While Adhir Ranjan Choudhury had made an open invitation to dissidents to leave the party and form their own, Salman Khurshid had reiterated that Rahul and Sonia Gandhi were the party’s leaders, which “even the opposition knows.”
“I do not accept that we have been rejected across the country. We do not have that support that we obviously aspire to. I am sure we have leaders,” Khurshid had said.
“The fact is that we know who the leader is, the fact is that we follow the leader. If we follow the leader and we don’t get what you think we should get, doesn’t that mean we’re going to give up the leader? You don’t think we have a leader, then they don’t know what the game is about, “he had said.
Addressing the question of a full-time president for the party, one of the key demands of the 23 dissidents whose letter in August had triggered a storm, Ghulam Nabi Azad said the Gandhis had been willing to appoint someone for October, but which is being delayed due to the coronavirus outbreak.
With contributions from ANI
.
