Worried Kesri again postpones Congress polls

Congress president Sitaram Kesri on Friday revised the schedule for his party organisational polls, to be conducted by July 15.

Party spokesperson V N Gadgil said the election process would start from May 22 and the final rolls would be published before June 1.

The Congress president would be elected on July 11 and the Pradesh Congress Committee presidents, office-bearers, executive and AICC members on July 12.

When it was pointed out that the Election Commission had directed that organisational polls should be completed by May 31, Gadgil said the party was confident of getting clearance from the commission. This, despite Chief Election Commissioner M S GIll having turned down the party's earlier request in this regard on April 22.

While senior Congress leaders, including Pranab Mukherjee, K Natwar Singh and Mani Shanker Aiyar said the schedule was rescheduled following requests from party MPs, there were indications that Kesri revised it for the second time because he feared some challenge to his position.

Mukherjee told the press that, barring a few occasions, the Congress president's election had been unanimous since 1950 and that things would be no different this time. He did not see anything unusual in the Congress president's election preceding those of the PCC presidents, despite the lack of precedent.

Party leaders insisted on Friday that party MPs had no time to work for the organisational elections due to political developments at the Centre in the last three weeks. Kesri said he had bowed to their pleas when he postponed the elections again.

However, a party joint secretary said Kesri had not appeared confident of being re-elected during meetings with PCC chiefs in the past five months. These officials said Kesri feared that Sharad Pawar's faction in the party may have set up former Maharashtra chief minister A.R Antulay as a dummy candidate for the party chief's post. They feel Pawar himself may put up his candidature at a later date. Fearing this, Kesri had decided to buy some more time.

These officials said Kesri may opt for legal redress if the Election Commission enforces its statutory rule that all political parties had to complete organisational elections by May 31.

Of course, it could prove a double-edged sword since, so far, the directive has never been implemented and a court judgment could make it mandatory.

Kesri also fears that the ruling United Front stands to gain in political terms if his own party replaces him as its leader. Spearheading a clandestine campaign to oust Kesri is former prime minister H D Deve Gowda whose government collapsed because Kesri withdrew Congress support to it.

According to Congress officials, it is also due to these fears Kesri has not yet cleared the formation of the coordination committee for the smooth functioning of the Gujral government.