United by Ayodhya, divided on Ganga

As fellow travellers in the Ram Mandir movement of the ’90s, minister for water resources, river development and Ganga rejuvenation Uma Bharati and veteran Bharatiya Janata Party leader Murli Manohar Joshi have always shared a close bond. Nobody can forget the famous photograph of a jubiliant Ms Bharati perched atop the shoulders of an equally ecstatic Mr Joshi when the Babri Masjid was torn down on that fateful day in 1992. However, the two leaders appear to have fallen out now. Ever since he was marginalised by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Mr Joshi has publicly criticised the National Democratic Alliance government’s flagship programme, Namami Gange, to clean the river waters, handled by Ms Bharati’s ministry. Hitting out at the ruling alliance on every given occasion, Mr Joshi has repeatedly stated that cleaning the Ganga would be a far-fetched dream till there was uninterrupted water flow in the river. Mr Joshi’s public pronouncement has predictably upset Ms Bharati. Although she has not responded publicly to Mr Joshi’s remarks, her aides maintain she is furious. Her angry camp followers have spread the word that Mr Joshi has no business making such statements as he was heading the expert committee which had cleared the construction of the controversial Tehri dam saying it would not have any impact on the purity of the Ganga’s waters.

Known to be frank and outspoken, Salman Khurshid, former minister of external affairs and senior Congress leader, has a penchant for getting into trouble with his irreverent comments. He was in the eye of a storm last year when he criticised Prime Minister Narendra Modi in the course of a lecture at the Jinnah Institute in Islamabad. Mr Khurshid had remarked that “Modi is not used to talking to people who disagree with him”, a comment which drew howls of protest back in India. So when he went for the Karachi Literature Festival last week to launch his latest book, The Other Side of the Mountain, it was expected that the former Indian minister would say something that would grab headlines and generate a heated debate. He was, therefore, asked by well-known Pakistani journalist Mehr Tarar, better known in India as former Union minister Shashi Tharoor’s friend, to refrain from saying anything controversial. Taking serious note of this request, Mr Khurshid decided to stick to the script, making sure he did not step out of line. A poker-faced Mr Khurshid began his presentation by stating that he will, henceforth, follow the example set by Mahatma Gandhi’s three monkeys. Unfortunately, his tongue-in-cheek comment was lost on the Karachi audience.

Former Union minister Kamal Nath has been virtually incommunicado ever since he was denied the post of the leader of the Congress parliamentary party after the 2014 Lok Sabha polls. The senior Congress leader has been barely seen or heard in the Lok Sabha and has no role in the Congress’ organisational matters. Therefore, it was surprising when party vice-president Rahul Gandhi requisitioned Mr Nath’s services to help him defuse the Arunachal Pradesh crisis. While former Union minister Kapil Sibal was entrusted with the task of handling the legal case being heard in the Supreme Court, Mr Nath was roped in to deal with the rebel legislators who had threatened to join the Bharatiya Janata Party if their demands were not met. As a veteran in the game, Mr Nath is among the few senior Congress leaders who can be counted on to handle such situations. While this is being seen as a sign of the return of the Congress old guard, the latest development has also fuelled speculation that Mr Nath may be projected as the party’s chief ministerial candidate in Madhya Pradesh and, as a step in that direction, he could be named the president of the Madhya Pradesh Congress Committee in the coming months.

It has been a virtual ghar wapsi for former Union minister Manish Tewari, who was recently reinducted into the Congress Party’s panel of spokespersons.

Mr Tewari, who had represented the Ludhiana Lok Sabha constituency, was in the doghouse for the past two years after he refused to contest the Lok Sabha elections. Although Mr Tewari continued to speak for the Congress on television, he did not figure in the official list of spokespersons despite the fact that he had earlier been a leading member of the party’s communications department. Mr Tewari had been impatient to return to his old job, but he was rehabilitated only now with an eye on next year’s Punjab Assembly polls. Having just bought peace in its faction-ridden state unit, the Congress leadership did not want to alienate Mr Tewari lest he created trouble for the party in Punjab. While a jubilant Mr Tewari must be celebrating his return to the party fold, there is a downside to this happy occasion: He will have to work under his junior, Randeep Singh Surjewala, present head of the party’s communications department. Mr Surjewala had taken over as Youth Congress president from Mr Tewari in 2000.

The writer is a Delhi-based journalist