Rahul Gandhi hits out at govt for trying to erase Nehru's legacy

Embittered Congress may refuse to play ball with BJP in Parliament

Noting the position of the opposition as an equal partner in nation-building to Jawaharlal Nehru’s governments, Congress Vice-President Rahul Gandhi on Tuesday slammed the National Democratic Alliance dispensation for not allowing it the rightful place. The Congress has been denied the place of the Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha after it was reduced to its lowest-ever electoral tally of 44 members after the elections earlier this year.

Addressing the delegates at the international conference on Nehru’s 125th birth anniversary, Rahul said: “…there are those who wish to rub him (Nehru) out, to erase him and his legacy from the country…”

While the Congress was vitriolic in its attack on the government, the party still appears to be undecided on whether it will be stonewalling the legislative agenda the government is keen to push through in the Winter session beginning next week.

While Rahul Gandhi reiterated that allowing room for dissent and alternative ideas was the cornerstone of Nehru’s ideology and that was sadly lacking now, he urged his partymen to stand up for what they believe in “no matter what the cost”.

Asked whether implied that the Congress now would be recalibrating its position on how to tackle the government in Parliament as regards clearing Bills like those on insurance and the GST, Congress deputy leader in the Rajya Sabha, Anand Sharma, also convenor of the international conference, told the Business Standard: “We will oppose the government tooth and nail on crucial issues like the dilution of social security and crony capitalism. There is still time. We will examine what our stand will be on these other Bills. What’s the hurry?”

The Congress is still contemplating whether to shift from its public position of being “a party that does not believe in opposing for the sake of opposing and unlike the BJP does not play partisan politics” or not cooperating with the government. Sharma went on record to attack the Narendra Modi-led government for trying to sabotage the Congress two-day event.

He said: “This government did not want the conference to be held. We were denied the venue Vigyan Bhavan on 14 November (the birth anniversary of Nehru) when it was not being used (by anybody). We did not get any cooperation. A little circular went out from here to (Indian) embassies telling them if world leaders called them, to direct them to the Congress. The aim was to dissuade them from coming. There were many other difficulties.”

While the party is still hammering out its role as a responsible opposition, its own house seems to be in disarray. Half the former UPA cabinet ministers were not present at the party’s top billed event. P Chidambaram, Kapil Sibal, Salman Khurshid — all eminent lawyers — were not present. Sources said while some of them were busy in court, others were abroad.

For former home minister Sunil Kumar Shinde — the invitation had apparantly not reached him!

For a party that has made no bones of the fact that as it was denied the Leader of the Opposition by the government, it stayed away from the swearing in ceremony of the expanded NDA Cabinet, it will soon have to take a call on whether to stonewall the government’s reform agenda or let its anger be a flash in the pan.