Haryana Congress chief Bhajan Lal’s attempt to armtwist the high command by going public with his resignation seems to have backfired. Congress party president Sonia Gandhi today accepted his resignation. Sources said the letter was received at Sonia’s office at least a week ago, but she did not act until the Haryana leader disclosed it to the media.‘‘Congress president has accepted the resignation of Mr Bhajan Lal as Haryana PCC chief today and other things are irrelevant,’’ said spokesperson Abhishek Singhvi.‘‘Since he has chosen to resign through the media, we accept his resignation also through the media,’’ a senior party functionary said, hardly concealing the high command’s displeasure with Lal, who has been chief minister of Haryana for 13 years in three terms. Ram Prakash, presently working president of the state unit, will function as acting president and may be eleveted as its chief shortly.In a strongly worded resgination letter, Lal had said he was stepping down as state Congress president as he could not see ‘‘the humiliation of the aam aadmi (comman man), the grassroots Congress worker and real Congress leaders.’’Lal’s attempt to bargain with the high command to get his son Kuldip Bishnoi inducted into the Union ministry turned out to be his undoing. Sonia and her advisors felt that the Bhajan Lal family had already been over-represented — his elder son Chandramohan is deputy chief minister and Bishnoi is a member of Parliament.Lal’s present showdown has an element of sibling rivarly too — Chandramohan has been supporting chief mninister Bhupinder Hooda, who is the target of ire for Bhajan Lal and Bishnoi. Chandramohan also endorsed the new executive of the state unit in which brother Bishnoi and supporters find no place.Party sources said Bhajan had overstretched his goodwill with the high command at the prompting of Bishnoi who is already under the scanner for anti-party activities. Bishnoi had to tender a written explanation for his outbursts against Hooda is pending with the high command but party seniors said they hoped the matter to settle.The party high command’s strong stance follows from its experience with K. Karunakaran, the Kerala veteran who left the party in a huff and is now desperate to get back. Karunakaran too walked out after hefty demands for his son K. Muralidharan was not met by the high command but had to eat a humble pie in the recent Assembly elections. The Central leadership hopes Bhajan Lal, with advancing age and after a slow run as the PCC chief, may not venture anything similar.Bhajan had left the party once in 1977 to become chief minister during the Janata Party rule but returned to Congress in 1980. Reacting to the decision, Bhajan Lal said he would decide the future course of action after consultation with his supporters but made it clear he had ‘‘no grudge’’ against the state government.
