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‘Differing views only exist in Cong’: Rahul addresses dissent in party
In the virtual interaction, weeks before assembly elections in five states, Gandhi also said that elections are about institutions ensuring framework, but that is no more available.
In his first public remarks about the so-called G23 leaders who have sought sweeping changes within the Congress, party leader Rahul Gandhi said on Tuesday that such differing points of view can only survive in his party.
In an interaction with a group of faculty members and students of the Brown University, Gandhi said: “In our party, 20 people have different views. Do you think they can exist in the BJP, BSP or Trinamool Congress?” He added that “negotiation can’t stop” inside the party even as a section has different viewpoints.
In August last year, 23 senior Congress leaders including former Union ministers Ghulam Nabi Azad, Anand Sharma, Kapil Sibal and Manish Tewari shot a letter to Congress president Sonia Gandhi, seeking sweeping changes in the party’s functioning and visible leadership, deepening the rift in the organisation.
On Tuesday, Gandhi, who is widely expected to return as the party’s president, said the Congress will remain “chaotic and constant” and never be a cadre-based organisation such as the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS). “The Congress is not the Nazi party. It’s not RSS. Our problem is negotiation between different sections have fractured. We are chaotic, we are constant. We are the conversation. That’s our system...,” he said.
In the virtual interaction, weeks before assembly elections in five states, Gandhi also said that elections are about institutions ensuring framework, but that is no more available.
The Wayanad MP also cautioned that if India can’t create jobs, it would face a “catastrophic” problem and said the ruling BJP and the RSS have destroyed institutional frameworks that would have protected people.
The BJP has, in the past rejected Gandhi’s allegations that the party and its ideological parent, RSS, have “destroyed the country’s institutional framework”. Last month, an RSS pracharak and BJP leader in Tamil Nadu, L Ganesan said, “RSS means discipline, nationalism and all other good qualities. If somebody says that RSS is influencing the judiciary or any field, people should feel happy that something good will happen. It is a compliment given by Rahul Gandhi to the judiciary...”
