Sheila effect? Rita Bahuguna In talks with BJP

NEW DELHI: The AICC on Monday refused to comment on the buzz that former UP Congress President Rita Bahuguna Joshi, daughter of yesteryears’ political stalwart Hemwati Nandan Bahuguna, is set to join the BJP and that she might have already met its party chief Amit Shah.
However, Congress circles are aware that Bahuguna had been sulking since Sheila Dikshit was made the CM candidate for UP.

The fact that she was not considered for any campaign assignments too gave the impression that the Congress brass had suspected her longevity in the party.

Some people sympathetic to Bahuguna maintain that she has better political and pedigree credentials than Dikshit to be the face of UP Congress.

While Bahuguna was not available for comments the fact that she made no efforts to quell the daylong reports about her imminent cross-over to BJP added credence to the buzz.

Though she has no major following, her desertion could jolt the Congress as she carries the legacy of her farther. The desertion will also expose fault lines of UP Congress’ projected efforts to ‘woo Brahmins’.

Secondly, Rita’s timing has coincided with Dikshit’s projection losing steam. While 78-year-old Dikshit was projected as the Congress CM candidate as she was the daughter-in-law of the late Congress stalwart Uma Shankar Diskhit and the ‘Dikshit bahu’ (even though a Punjabi Khatri) who could ‘attract UP Brahmins.’

Unlike her impressive electoral record in Delhi, Dikshit won just once, in 1984, and lost thrice, thereafter, in UP, before shifting to Delhi. On the other hand, 67-year old Bahuguna is a former UP Congress chief, ex-mayor of Allahabad, a Congress MLA and a former national president of Mahila Congress.