Cong issues gag order after Digvijay fiasco

After prime minister Manmohan Singh unequivocally endorsed Union home minister P Chidambaram’s handling of left-wing extremism in the wake of the Dantewada ambush, the Congress on Wednesday issued a gag order, asking party workers not to air discordant views on the issue.

The party disapproved All India Congress Committee general secretary Digvijay Singh’s criticism of Chidambaram’s handling of the Naxalite problem. Singh had, in an editorial for a newspaper, slammed Chidambaram’s policy on countering the Maoists.

This is considered unusual in political circles as Singh has been very close to the party high command in general and Rahul Gandhi in particular. Snubbing Singh, Congress’s media department chief Janardhan Dwivedi said, “Congress is a democratic party. Every one has a right to express his or her views but such views should be expressed within party fora only.”