Young Turks vs Old Guards: Digvijaya Singh lashes out at Pilot, Scindia for 'walking out on Congress'

The Young Turks vs Old Guards debate in Indian politics seems to have once again come to the foreground in view of the recurrence of the internal grievances within Congress. A day after Sachin Pilot was sacked from Congress, former Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister took to his official handle on Twitter and lashed out at both rebel leaders - Sachin Pilot and Jyotiraditya Scindia for 'walking out on the Congress'.

The 'Old Guard', Digvijaya Singh, ramped up his attack by sharing old videos of the 'Young Turks', Pilot, and Scindia, where the then-emerging leaders could be seen sitting together about the developmental and positive work done by the Congress.

Judging by the content, it seems like the video was shot in 2018, and the two leaders - Pilot and Scindia - were campaigning for the Congress ahead of the Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh state assembly polls that year.

"At the national level, people had high confidence in these two emerging leaders. Now listen to what they are saying and what they are doing," pointed out Digvijaya Singh while sharing the videos.

राष्ट्रीय स्तर पर इन दो उभरते हुए नेताओं पर लोगों को बहुत विश्वास था उम्मीदें थीं। अब ज़रा सुनिए यह क्या कह रहे हैं और क्या कर रहे हैं। pic.twitter.com/rOkS1AF3Mp

— digvijaya singh (@digvijaya_28) July 15, 2020

pic.twitter.com/Mhj6phTfG2

— digvijaya singh (@digvijaya_28) July 15, 2020

On Tuesday, Congress sacked veteran leader Sachin Pilot from the post of the Deputy Chief Minister of Rajasthan and as well as the party's state unit chief over differences. The Congress, in a statement, said that Pilot was "ensnared" by the BJP to bring down the Ashok Gehlot-led Congress government in Rajasthan. Two other ministers, Vishvender Singh and Ramesh Meena, who had joined Pilot in rebelling against the current regime in the state have also been dropped.

In many ways, the situation in Rajasthan has eerie callbacks to the crisis in Madhya Pradesh Congress months ago. Even though Jyotirdatiya Scindia had remained a loyal and veteran leader for the grand old party in Madhya Pradesh for the longest time, it was rumoured that Scindia was never going to be the first preference for the Congress in the elections to the Rajya Sabha seats. This, coupled with the fact that Congress central leadership chose veteran leader Kamal Nath over Scindia as Chief Minister of the state fueled rumours that there was a rift within Madhya Pradesh Congress. There were reports of alleged infighting and rumours that Scindia was feeling "ignored" within the grand old party.

Finally, the straw broke and Scindia switched sides over to the saffron camp in March, earlier this year.

According to reports, Scindia had been sulking for a long time as he was neither assured of a Rajya Sabha berth nor made the state Congress unit chief, a position that is still held by Chief Minister Kamal Nath.

Now, speculations turned rife that the erstwhile Deputy Chief Minister Sachin Pilot was unhappy with Gehlot, especially after the Special Operations Group (SOG) of Rajasthan sent a notice to Pilot seeking his availability for recording his statement in connection with alleged attempts to destabilise state government. Finally, the situation culminated in Pilot being sacked from the Rajasthan cabinet.

Sachin Pilot is considered to have played a crucial role in reviving the party following its worst defeat in the state in the 2013 state assembly elections. The 2018 assembly polls were fought under his command, and the party managed to seize power in the state following the win in the assembly elections.

However, he was not given the post of the Chief Minister and the party's leadership mandated him the post of the Deputy Chief Minister, while he remained the Rajasthan Congress president.