Set to lose five to seven of its 64 seats in the Rajya Sabha in the elections on Saturday, the Congress is pulling out all the stops to maximise its victories, especially in Karnataka, Uttar Pradesh, and Haryana, in some cases, even at the expense of annoying a State unit.
Indeed, less than 24 hours before the polls, Congress president Sonia Gandhi’s decision to back Independent candidate R.K. Anand — a lawyer and former Congressman — along with political rival Indian National Lok Dal has caused heartburn in its Haryana unit. Party sources said that by joining hands with the INLD that represents Jats, the Congress is diluting its own Jat constituency. The party leadership’s view is that if the Congress does not back Mr. Anand, the BJP will win an extra seat — and at the moment the party’s focus should be on keeping the BJP’s numbers as low as possible.
Haryana camp unhappy
On Friday afternoon, the former Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda arrived here late for a meeting on the subject, looking sullen, and accompanied by 12 of the party’s 17 MLAs in a show of strength. Those already there included Kuldeep Bishnoi and his wife Renuka Bishnoi, both MLAs (who recently merged their Haryana Janhit Congress into the Congress), MLAs Kiran Chowdhury and Randeep Surjewala, PCC chief Ashok Tanwar and party general secretary B.K. Hariprasad. With consensus eluding the meeting, a one-line resolution empowering Ms. Gandhi to take a decision was taken.
Later, party spokesperson Manish Tewari said, “Mr. Anand sought the Congress’s support, saying he would back the party inside and outside Parliament.
After the Haryana CLP passed a resolution, Ms. Gandhi agreed that to defeat the BJP, it was essential for the party to support Mr. Anand.” The party leadership is now keeping its fingers crossed that all its MLAs vote for Mr. Anand on Saturday.
In Karnataka, the party’s 122 MLAs have enough votes to get former Union Ministers Jairam Ramesh and Oscar Fernandes through, but the surplus is not enough to get a third candidate, former senior IPS officer K.C. Ramamurthy, though without help from outside — so it is looking to the dissidence-hit 40-member strong Janata Dal (S) for help.
Sibal faces BJP challenge
All eyes are on Uttar Pradesh, where the former Union Minister Kapil Sibal is facing a challenge from a BJP-backed Independent and wealthy socialite Preeti Mahapatra. The Congress has 29 MLAs and needs the backing of five more MLAs to get Mr. Sibal through.
The party hopes that the Bahujan Samaj Party — that has 12 votes more than it needs to get its own candidates Satish Chandra Mishra and Ashok Sidharth through — will oblige it. But thus far, BSP supremo Mayawati has not opened her cards. But the Congress is drawing confidence from the fact that in neighbouring Madhya Pradesh, she has announced that her four MLAs will back the Congress candidate and Supreme Court lawyer Vivek Tankha.
Senior Congress leaders Kamal Nath and Sushil Kumar Shinde are camping in Bhopal to ensure Mr.Tankha’s victory as he is short of just one vote to sail through.
In Uttarakhand, Congress’ Pradeep Tamta faces a tough contest with two Idependents in the fray. Here, too, the BSP could decide the winner.
Thirty of the total 57 seats in the current round of biennial elections have already been decided without a contest. Saturday’s polls will decide the fate of the remaining 27.
