A controversy appears to be brewing with the media adviser to the Prime Minister, Mr Harish Khare, launching a scathing attack on the Congress Party at a book release function here on Monday evening. His description of the Congress as a "status quoist party" was strongly objected to by AICC general secretary Digvijay Singh, who was present at the book launch.
Mr Khare, while talking about the Congress, said: "The Congress by nature is entirely a status quoist, centrist party. It does not believe in conviction. The only conviction it has is in how to win elections."
Mr Khare’s remarks came during a panel discussion after the release of the book Developmental State and the dalit question in Madhya Pradesh: Congress response, by Sudha Pai, a professor of political science at Jawaharlal Nehru University. The AICC general secretary, who too was a panelist, countered this, saying: "I do not agree that the Congress is a party of status quoists".
When contacted later, Mr Khare clarified that during the discussion he had not been referring to the Congress of today but to the state of the party in Madhya Pradesh in 1993-2003. "I was not talking about the Congress of now," he told this newspaper. He also clarified that he had not attended the book launch in his capacity as the PM’s media adviser but "in my capacity as a student and scholar of the Congress Party."
Mr Khare also referred to the Kshatriya-Harijan-Adivasi-Muslim (Kham) formula of the Congress in Gujarat and said he felt this experiment did "not yield lasting political benefits."
The book, incidentally, points a finger at the then Madhya Pradesh government, headed by Mr Digvijay Singh, over the distribution of land to the landless. Mr Khare felt that Mr Singh had lost the 2003 election over such allotments, since when the Congress has not been able to return to power in the state. He also spoke of factionalism in the MP Congress and claimed that Mr Digvijay Singh was "caught in it... since some demands were being made by Arjun Singh."
Mr Khare added that until "there is a political structure in place to deal with conflict, all good intentions will come to nought." He felt there had been a "marked decline of collective self-confidence" by the political class. The focus now "was only to win elections".
Opposing Mr Khare’s viewpoint, Mr Singh said he "does not agree that the Congress is a party of status quoists". The former MP chief minister cited examples such as the abolition of zamindari and of privy purses to argue that the party did not believe in being "status quoist". He also said that the party’s defeat was due to its "inability to keep pace with social change".