Gurugram: In-fighting within the Congress’s Haryana unit was laid bare Tuesday, as supporters of former Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda clashed with those of senior leaders Kumari Selja and Randeep Surjewala in Karnal. The development came on the same day that Selja and Surjewala, met party president Mallikarjun Kharge and party general secretary (organisation) K.C. Venugopal to share their grievances against Hooda and Haryana Congress chief Udai Bhan, ThePrint has learnt.
Talking to ThePrint about the meeting Wednesday, Selja said, “The coordinators appointed [by the party to record workers’s preference for district office bearers] for the districts are completely biased. They are speaking the language of just one person.” She, however, refrained from taking Hooda’s name.
Selja added that both she and Surjewala, were in poll-bound Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh, respectively — both states go for polls later this year — when they had to rush to Delhi to convey to the party leadership the resentment among Congress workers in Haryana.
A member of the Congress Working Committee (CWC), the highest decision-making body in the Congress, Selja is a former Union minister, who had also served as the president of the Haryana Congress for nearly three years between September 2019 and April 2022.
The leader alleged that the reason an organizational setup could not be created in the state for nine years — a reference to the fact that since 2014 all official posts in Haryana Congress except that of the party chief have remained vacant — is the “main aur meri rajneeti (I and my politics)” attitude prevalent in the state party unit, where the views of others are not tolerated.
“It is against the spirit of Rahul Gandhi’s policy of taking all together that he exhibited clearly during his Bharat Jodo Yatra,” Selja added.
Echoing her, Surjewala added, “Selja ji and I have come here to bring the pain and agony of those workers to the notice of the party’s central leadership. We have met adhyaksh ji (Kharge) and mahasachiv ji (Venugopal) and brought all the facts to their notice. Since it is the party’s internal matter, we would not like to discuss this with the media, but the manner in which some people were trying to encourage infighting in a state where the party looks certain to come to power next year. This is not acceptable at all. If someone tries to sideline the party workers leaving them in disappointment and disillusionment, this will not be acceptable for us.”
The Rajya Sabha member further claimed that he and Selja have witnessed the ups and downs in the party for generations. “When all others left the Congress, we and our workers kept the party alive in Haryana,” he said.
ThePrint also reached former CM Hooda over phone Wednesday, but he refused to comment on the issue.
ThePrint also reached Haryana Congress president Udai Bhan on phone, but received no response till the time of publication of this report. The article will be updated once a response is received.
However, former deputy Union minister Jai Prakash, in-charge in charge of ensuring an organisation set-up in Hisar, rubbished allegations of any bias on the part of coordinators.
“The only job of the coordinators is to ascertain the views of the workers on who should be their district president. The workers are free to express their views. The coordinators are not supposed to appoint the district president. This will be done by the AICC in-charge of Haryana, Deepak Bawaria,” said Jai Parkash.
He also dismissed the grievances raised by Selja and Surjewala as “misunderstanding”.
Meanwhile, former Haryana Congress chief Ashok Tanwar who joined the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) last year, shared a video Tuesday, calling out to Congress party workers to join the AAP. ThePrint has accessed the video.
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In-party politics
Tuesday’s factional clash in Congress came even as party-appointed coordinators Yograj Bhadoria (All India Congress Committee coordinator) and Jarnail Singh and S.L. Sharma (Haryana Pradesh Congress Committee coordinators) were on a visit to the district to gauge the workers’s wish on the appointment of office bearers for the district.
Similar scenes were reportedly witnessed when the party observers went to Bhiwani, Charkhi Dadri and Narnaul Sunday and at Jind and Hisar Monday.
Workers owing allegiance to MLA Kiran Choudhry and her daughter Shruti Choudhry clashed with those allied to Hooda supporter Rao Dan Singh, at Bhiwani, Charkhi Dadri and Narnaul, while Hooda and Surjewala supporters clashed at Jind and Hisar.
Sources within the Congress told ThePrint that ever since the coordinators appointed by the HPCC have begun meeting party workers in the districts to ascertain their views on who should be appointed president of the party in their respective districts, workers of rival groups within the party have been clashing with each other.
Workers owing allegiance to the Selja-Surjewala and Kiran Choudhury groups have also alleged that the attitude of the coordinators is biased in favour of the Hooda camp.
During the past nine years, the Haryana Congress has had three state presidents – former Sirsa MP Ashok Tanwar, Selja and now, Udai Bhan, who has been the state Congres president since April last year. However, no other state or district office bearers have been appointed in the state during this time.
Talking about Tuesday’s clash, Tanwar, in his video message said, “Once again, we saw a tamasha [spectacle] in Haryana’s Karnal. We have seen this infighting at Bhiwani, Jind, Hisar, and Narnaul in the past three days. At a time, when Congress leaders should have been fighting for people on the street, they have been fighting with each other. They could not remember organisational structure in the past four years, and now when the AAP has made hundreds of appointments at the state and at the ground level, they have begun this exercise.”
Making an appeal to Congress workers to join AAP, Tanwar said that the Congress leaders will always keep fighting for power.
“There is no use in remaining in the party where the leaders don’t respect each other and rather keep fighting for power hunger. I have been able to come out of that hell and now you too come out and join us for the better future of the state,” he added.
Talking to The Print Wednesday, the AAP leader further alleged that he tried hard to put in place an organisation set-up in Haryana during his term as Congress party president, but his efforts were constantly foiled.
(Edited by Poulomi Banerjee)
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