Aditi Phadnis: His master's voice?

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Jairam Ramesh

What he suggested was unexceptionable, which is why it is surprising that it got the response it did. Rajya Sabha MP from the Congress, Jairam Ramesh last week proposed that Parliament pass a resolution that any disinvestment in a PSU, even though this might not dilute the government's management control stake of 51 per cent, be okayed by Parliament first.

Theoretically, as PSUs were set up spending state funds that belong to the people of India, Parliament should have been the right forum to ask before divesting a share of the companies owned by the people of India. However, the Congress party frowned in disapproval at Ramesh's suggestion, the Left parties rejected it altogether and that was the end of it.

But is it really? Was it the proposal that was thrown out? Or was it way to deliver a set-down to the quarters that made the suggestion? The answer lies in a complicated minuet of group politics that is going on in the Congress.

When the Congress party comes to power in coalition with a set of political forces, it is natural for it to work out how best to transact business with its coalition partners. In Kerala, for instance, in order to keep coalition partner Muslim League happy, the Congress had to adopt a strongly pro-Muslim stance.

But, Karunakaran, while being the leader of the same coalition, decided he was going make the Hindus his personal constituency, and balance the religious equation nicely.

In the Congress, there are two ways to earning recognition as a leader. You can slog your way through the grind of state-level politics, or you can leverage your party's coalition partners, concede that they have a point, and work at making their point of view more acceptable inside the Congress.

Party leaders see Jairam Ramesh as negotiating this complicated move. The debate in Congress circles is that having once compromised and resolved that the Congress will participate in coalitions, it can either try and adjust the party to the demands of a coalition or retain the pristine purity of "Congress" ideology and stay out of power.

Party leaders see Jairam Ramesh as trying to get ahead manoeuvring the former option. They don't like it. Ramesh has emerged as Sonia Gandhi's ideological right hand man. This is causing all the more disquiet. The party is confused about whether the suggestion is coming from 10 Janpath or from Ramesh's quicksilver mind.