Rahul assimilates Jharkhand Cong undercurrents

It happened when everyone was jostling for a photo opportunity with Congress general secretary Rahul Gandhi in Ranchi. A Congress worker quietly passed him a tiny paper, which Rahul glanced at hurriedly and dropped into his pocket.

The Congress scion has been chased with petitions galore, seeking personal and political grants, but this particular petitioner wanted him to stop ad hocism and end rehabilitation of non-performers in the State unit.

The plea is more urgent than a single voice - it is the need of the hour for the disintegrating State Congress. And the petitioner merely threw the rulebook at Rahul on the issue of rehabilitation.

Top party sources confided that Gandhi, who quietly launched Mission 2014, has dropped thick hints of bringing new and dynamic faces into the party organisation here. Under the scheme, Pradeep Kumar Balmuchu— continuing as State president—could be relieved and is likely to be rehabilitated in the Central body.  Balmuchu, long overstaying his tenure, has been continuing under an ad hoc arrangement from 2008, with two subsequent extensions.

Sonia Gandhi, party sources confided, is learnt to be keen on a team rejig by the end October. The organisational reshuffle is likely to coincide with the proposed change in the Central Cabinet, which may come as a farewell event for Union Minister Subodh Kant Sahay, who has courted the displeasure of the Gandhis over Coalgate. During his two-day visit, Rahul met several State leaders for feedbacks over the proposed party restructuring. The most urgent and common demand remained the appointment of a new president.

Balmuchu, though, did not give credence to any such widely-discussed latent move of Rahul’s Jharkhand visit, saying, “Rahulji never visits with such mandate. I will continue till the Central leadership wishes.”

But party insiders had a different say. “He sought our views and assured us that he would look into this matter. We were given to believe that he was serious about the affairs of the State party and demand for a new president,” said a senior party leader.

Sources said Rahul wants to test the Uttar Pradesh model in Jharkhand. He had divided Uttar Pradesh in various divisions from organisational point of view and made subsequent appointment of divisional in-charges, who would be parallel to the State head.

The move may work well to frustrate the tendency of too much centralisation of power and as a measure to stop infighting and factionalism.

For instance, Congress Jamshedpur (West) MLA Banna Gupta told Rahul candidly that leaders and workers have no choice to remain neutral in a faction-ridden State Congress. They have to identify either with the Balmuchu faction or that of the Sahays.

Even Balmuchu is aware of a growing sense of discomfort in a section of party leaders. Blessed by Oscar Fernandes at the Centre, he not only managed extension for him but mercilessly punctured the move of his desperate detractors.

Rahul has returned with enough feedbacks about State organisation. A couple of top leaders are likely to be summoned to Delhi within a couple of weeks. And when he does report to his mother about Jharkhand affairs, the memo of that unknown party worker will help him make the right points.