3 pro-change leaders dare CWC to take instant action after Ambika Soni attacks them

NEW DELHI: ‘Pro-change’ leaders Ghulam Nabi Azad, Anand Sharma, Mukul Wasnik and Jitin Prasada asserted at Monday’s CWC meeting that they did not commit anti-party activities by seeking remedial steps from Congress interim president Sonia Gandhi to end the party’s leadership and organisational crisis, it is learnt.

Facing over 45 ‘loyalists’, egged on by Sonia-Rahul combine’s disapproving remarks, and with Ambika Soni seeking disciplinary action against them, Azad, Sharma and Wasnik dared the CWC to take action “here and now” and asserted that they “shall remain Congressmen” irrespective of what the CWC did. While the trio ‘fought the mob attack’, the younger Jitin Prasada stood by them and said their letter contained important concerns on the party which deserved to be discussed.

Though most CWC members, including the Gandhis, disapproved of the letter, none of them discussed issues raised in the letter despite Rahul Gandhi saying issues should be internally raised and discussed.


Enraged by the attack on them, Azad, Sharma and Wasnik asserted those who deserted the Congress, Indira Gandhi and Sanjay Gandhi in 1978, ‘fortune seekers’ and ‘political tourists’ in Congress and the CWC had no credentials to question their ‘Congress DNA’ and commitment to party ideals. They recollected how those who braved lathis and stood by Congress, Indira Gandhi and Sanjay Gandhi were thrown into jail.

“Our body still bears marks of the torture we suffered,” said one of them. They recollected how they fought alongside Indira-Sanjay to enable the Congress to return to power in 1980.

Then Youth Congress chief Ambika Soni and some current CWC members, incidentally, were among those who were in the rival faction opposed to Indira-Sanjay when the Congress split after the post-Emergency polls, before they re-joined the party later.

Azad denied Rahul’s charge that the letter was written when Sonia Gandhi was ailing. He said the letter was sent on August 7, a week after Gandhi was discharged and they were assured she was perfectly alright.

The trio strongly denied they leaked contents of the letter and asserted what appeared in the media were “excerpts leaked selectively by sections in the AICC.” They challenged the leadership to conduct an internal inquiry into the leak.