The ruckus at Congress president Sonia Gandhi’s rally held in Mumbai last week made headlines in all Marathi dailies—Lokmat Times, Loksatta, Maharashtra Times
The ruckus at Congress president Sonia Gandhi’s rally held in Mumbai last week made headlines in all Marathi dailies—Lokmat Times, Loksatta, Maharashtra Times, Sakal, Samana, Navshakti and Navakal.
In the backdrop of dissidents led by revenue minister Narayan Rane against chief minister Vilasrao Deshmukh, the event exposed the deep-rooted factionalism within the state organisation and the very purpose of Gandhi’s rally, to unite the state unit ahead of the crucial Lok Sabha polls, proved to be a failure.
The MPCC chief Prabha Rau has now decided to take disciplinary action against the protesters, as the AICC has asked for a report. But the biggest challenge for the state Congress is to identity the culprits, and more important, their political god fathers.
The deadlock between the Congress and Left Front over the nuclear deal with the United States, leading to uncertainty at the Centre, captured the front pages of all the language dailies.
Even as the Congress is trying to muster support from its allies to prevent UPA’s downfall, it has set the ball rolling for early Lok Sabha elections. As a result, all the major political parties of the region—Congress, NCP, BJP and Shiv Sena—have already started discussing political strategies, possible alliances and seat sharing formulas.
However, despite being an alliance, the Congress and NCP continue to take pot shots at each other. The latest was a tongue-in-check comment by NCP president Sharad Pawar who taunted MPCC chief Prabha Rau by saying, “Well, we have all seen what happened at Sonia Gandhi’s rally.
We don’t have to take lessons on culture and discipline from your party.” Earlier, Rau had reminded Pawar not to forget the Congress culture since he has used the word Congress in the name his organisation, Nationalist Congress Party.
The intra-sect friction between the socio-religious communities in Punjab played itself out in Mumbai last week as Dera Sacha Sauda’s religious head Ram Rahim’s presence in Mumbai, followed by protest and killing of an innocent Sikh boy, created chaos on the streets.
Mumbaikars were held captive in their own homes last Sunday as a group of aggressive sword-wielding Sikh youth ran amuck bringing public transport to a halt. The event saw state politicians such as Shiv Sena chief Bal Thackeray appealing to the Sikhs to behave and MNS leader Raj Thackeray questioning the home department on why it was not arresting the armed protestors.
The local papers prominently highlighted junior Thackeray’s condemning the Sikh violence. Sensing the public fury, the Sikh community across the state and also Punjab assured they would not use weapons to display their displeasure in future.
k_shubhangi@dnaindia.net
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