Congress will follow coalition dharma, Sonia tells allies

NEW DELHI: Congress president Sonia Gandhi on Friday stepped in to iron out the creases in the ruling alliance by assuring her allies that her party will observe coalition dharma. Ms Gandhi, who indicated her party’s willingness to pamper the Congress’ backers, also rolled back her ‘those-against-the-nuclear-deal-are-enemies-of-development’ statement.

Speaking at a leadership summit here, Ms Gandhi said that her party would make every attempt to take the allies along in important policy issues. Admitting the differences in the ruling side over the nuclear deal, Ms Gandhi said that the two sides were attempting to understand each other’s viewpoints. “This should not be seen as a confrontation,” she said when it was pointed out that many of the senior leaders were making macho statements against the Left on the nuclear deal. “We are only firmly putting across our viewpoints,” she said.

The Congress president clarified that her Jhajjar speech where, she hit out at the critics of the nuclear deal, was not targeted at the Left. “I was speaking on those opposing the Haryana government,” she said. “We are working in a coalition. If I want to say about something which I don’t agree with them, the last thing I would do is to go out and shout and scream and say I don’t approve of it. I don’t agree. I would call that person and tell him directly that I don’t agree with you,” she said.

Ms Gandhi attempted to distance her party from some senior ministers’ insinuations that the Left’s opposition to the deal was largely dictated by their anxiety to please their handlers in Beijing. “We have never said that they are opposing the deal at China’s behest.” The Left has been angry over such suggestions from the Congress. Ms Gandhi also chose not to question the ‘static’ nature of Left’s ideology. The Congress president, who said the Left has the right to uphold its ideology, added the allies are only expressing their views on issues such as the nuclear deal.

Ms Gandhi, who rejected suggestions that coalition politics constitutes a nightmarish scenario, said her party was determined to work with like-minded forces. Implicit in this was an acknowledgement that coalition politics is neither an aberration or a temporary phenomenon.

The Congress has of late been under attack from the Left for its inability to develop the requisite habits and attitudes for give and take that are critical to the running of a coalition. At a meeting with the Congress leadership, CPM general secretary went to the extent of saying that the Congress should learn a thing or two on running coalition. Prakash Karat had asked the government why the Congress cannot dump the nuclear deal if the BJP could put all the contentious issues like the Ram temple, scrapping of Article 370 and uniform civil code on the backburner for the sake of NDA.

Ms Gandhi’s Friday statement clearly indicate her anxiety to keep the Left in good humour. Her party, which sees the Left as a better ally than parties like the BSP, does not want to close the option of a tie-up with the Left after the next general election.