The young may get a taste of power

NEW DELHI: Congress president Sonia Gandhi on Friday indicated that a reshuffle in the council of ministers might be in the offing during which ‘younger faces’ might be introduced into the UPA government.

Taking a question on whether young MPs and party leaders would be given a bigger role in the Parliament and in the government, Ms Gandhi replied that in the recent party organisational reshuffle, the Congress had given responsibilities to quite a number of young MPs and non-MPs.

“We were going to introduce younger people in the government too. I hope that will be possible,” she said, while interacting with the audience at a leadership summit in the Capital. Asked directly if a reshuffle exercise was on the cards, she quipped: “You should have asked the Prime Minister.”

The reconstituted All India Congress Committee (AICC) now has the party’s GenNext leader Rahul Gandhi as the general secretary in-charge of the Youth Congress and the National Students’ Union of India (NSUI). Along with Mr Gandhi, other young MPs such as Jyotiraditya Scindia, Sachin Pilot, Milind Deora and Sandeep Dikshit were made part of new departments meant to chart the party’s future course.

The party also inducted a number of young secretaries in Meenakshi Natarajan, Jitin Prasada, Madhu Goud Yashki and Priya Dutt. Going by the ‘one man, one post’ principle, the Congress might therefore find it difficult to induct faces from this crowd into the government immediately (with the exception of Jyotiraditya Scindia who was on the Congress Working Committee’s list of special invitees even earlier).

One young leader who is expected to find a place in the government whenever the reshuffle happens is DMK chief M Karunanidhi’s daughter Kanimozhi. Other than the DMK, two other Congress allies — the RJD and the NCP — are also expected to get berths in any forthcoming reshuffle.

From the Congress side, there are AICC functionaries who could be moved into the government. The reverse is also possible with speculation rife that minister of state (MoS) Suresh Pachauri could be sent to Madhya Pradesh to head the Pradesh Congress Committee. Such a move would create another vacancy in the government.

The MoS in the Prime Ministers’ Office, Prithviraj Chauhan, has been inducted into the party as a general secretary and another MoS Ajay Maken has been made party in-charge for two states. In their cases, there is no clarity whether they will be moved out of the government or whether they will be allowed to keep both posts. The news of the reshuffle might also keep certain Congress chief ministers, who might be on their way to be replaced, on the tenterhooks.

Then there are under-represented states such as Chhattisgarh and Delhi which have been lobbying for a place in the Cabinet. The coal ministry might see JMM chief Shibu Soren’s return with his name being cleared in the Sashinath Jha murder case.

On being questioned about the speculation that Rahul Gandhi was being prepared for succession, Ms Gandhi replied at the function: “I don’t think it is accurate at all.” She said in the Nehru-Gandhi family, as in other families which were in politics for long time, the next generation did get a “headstart”. “But in a democratic system you have to prove yourself,” Ms Gandhi said and pointed out that this was true in all spheres of activity.

On being asked what was next in store for Mr Gandhi, she replied: “He is planning to work hard. He has been working in his constituency for three years. Now he feels he can take on the responsibility of being the general secretary of the Youth Congress and the NSUI. I don’t see it as a step towards anything more than that.” Mr Gandhi is expected to go to Gujarat to campaign in the upcoming Assembly elections.