Tags:
Journalism of Courage
Former chief minister and Gujarat Congress president Amarsinh Chaudhary, after having been removed from his post, has turned down the party high command’s request to take over as the Congress Legislature Party president. He also reportedly approached Samajwadi Party chief Mulayam Singh Yadav to try and set up a third front in Gujarat.
Chaudhary, when contacted in Delhi, refused to confirm this, but sources close to him confided he had threatened to quit the party. Asked about his next move, Chaudhary said: ‘‘I will decide this in the next three-four days.’’ But he denied having spoken to Mulayam.
A defiant Chaudhary is meeting party president Sonia Gandhi on Tuesday and, according to party sources in Delhi, will confront her with his question: ‘‘If I am convinced of my fault, I will have no complaints. I will go away quietly to Gujarat. Otherwise, she will have to reconsider her decision.’’
Reports of Chaudhary meeting Mulayam appear more to be an effort to generate pressure on the party high command than a serious plan on his part to quit. Again, the party high command’s offer of the CLP leadership is a bid to appease Chaudhary who has refused it. He said: ‘‘I can’t go back to the same post from which I was made the state president.’’
