Look who's calling Sonia a foreigner

NEW DELHI: A few days after Sonia Gandhi virtually announced that Natwar Singh has no place in the Congress, the suspended leader has retaliated by launching a frontal attack on the All India Congress Committee (AICC) president.

Reacting to Ms Gandhi’s charge that that he had “betrayed” her trust and “misused” the party position in the Iraqi oil deal, the former external affairs minister alleged on Sunday that Ms Gandhi was behind his recent problems with the Enforcement Directorate in the oil-for-food scam.

Taking a dig at Ms Gandhi’s foreign origin, the estranged Gandhi family loyalist also claimed to know “many things” that could spell trouble for both the party and the Congress chief. With his formal expulsion from the party now seeming inevitable, Mr Singh dropped enough hints that he will be available to anti-Congress political suitors.

Mr Singh, who has so far been avoiding a direct attack on Ms Gandhi even while targeting the prime minister and some other Union ministers for his post-Volcker troubles, said: “Everything that the government did against me was on Sonia’s direction. I will not blame (prime minister) Manmohan Singh.” He said he fears that he and his family might be “jailed and harm can come” to his family members, including his grandson.

Mr Singh and his son are facing a series of investigations from the ED and CBI in connection with the oil scam in the wake of the Volcker revelations. Ms Gandhi’s public comments against him, coming soon after the appointment of Mr Pranab Mukherjee as the external affairs minister, is widely seen as her way for formally signing Mr Singh off.

Responding to Ms Gandhi’s remarks that she was betrayed by him, Mr Singh quipped: “Betrayal is a strong word. According to Indian culture, such words are not used for a person older to her by 15 years.” Taking a dig at the Congress chief’s foreign origins, Mr Singh added: “Only those who are born on Indian soil will understand the country’s ethos and culture. Others will not.”

Perhaps aware that his blunt attack on Ms Gandhi could bring him in the direct line of Congress fire, Mr Singh gave an impression that he was waiting for the expulsion. “Why don’t they sack me from the party if I am guilty?”

Claiming to know a lot about Ms Gandhi and the Congress, Mr Singh said, rather challengingly, “You see, I know a lot of things about the party and the leadership,” adding that he had many things up his sleeve.

Asked about Ms Gandhi’s assertion that she only had “working relations” with him, Mr Singh made it a point to publicise the close relations his family had shared with 10 Janpath by pointing out that Ms Gandhi had invited him and his wife to Priyanka Gandhi’s wedding in 1995.

“No other Congress leader except Sheila Dikshit was invited,” he said. “I stood by her during (former prime minister) P V Narshima Rao’s tenure,” the former Union minister added.

On his future political career, Mr Singh said, “I have many options which I will exercise when the time comes. But let the Congress leadership decide about me first.” On reports that he was planning to join the Samajwadi Party, Mr Singh chose to keep his friends and foes guessing by quipping, “Many people are in touch with me.”