Form a panel and forget the issue!

Strap: Committees formed by JPCC lead nowhere

VIJAY DEO JHA / PRANAV PRATYUSH

Ranchi

For close to a year now Jharkhand Congress has been forming committee after committee to locate the roots of trouble in the party, but, committees have not come anywhere near to the address of the trouble.

In the last one year State Congress formed six committees with much hype; only to chuck it in the political dustbin, sometimes after, with ‘no-action-taken-over.’ In some of the cases the party even forgot that a committee was formed to address and ascertain trouble brewing in the party, in others it announced a committee that was never formed.

After a couple of Congress MLAs like Sawna Lakda and Yogendra Saw were caught on camera in ‘cash for vote scam’ during Rajya Sabha election, the party had announced to form a committee. Even if the party was caught in embarrassing situation it did not move an inch to fix responsibility.

A senior Congress leader gave a lighter explanation to this offering the grey side of the story. “We form committee on every matter. After all, the formation of a committee or a mere announcement gives the media a story,” he quipped.

A famous committee formed over Lakda to ascertain degree of his association in the murder case of a city boy was bundled before to reach to any conclusion. State Congress spokesperson Sailendra Singh defends the decision. “There was no need of the committee after Lakda was arrested and suspended from the party. Keeping such committees like this where law has taken its own course has no meaning,” he said.

But former Congress MLA Sukhdeo Bhagat is still in anxious wait of the report of seven member committee that was formed in the month of May after his name was dragged in a sleaze act. The committee comprising of Harinarayan Prasad, convener KS Chatterjee, Asiq Ansari, Kamta Prasad, PK Singh, Sahdeo Munda and Ramgopal Bhuwaniya has already submitted report to the state Congress president Pradeep Balmuchu. Action still awaits but many party insiders believed the reports contained less fact and more fiction to settle political score with Bhagat.

In the spate of the killing of the Congress workers a year back party had formed a committee comprising off Stephen Marandi, Radhakrishna Kishore and Niel Tirkey and Rajya Sabha MP Dhiraj Sahu to submit report over threat on the party workers. Except Sahu the committee members visited seven Maoist affected districts for fact finding. The committee submitted report with measures to be taken. Nobody knows the fate of the report and the action taken therein.

“When you are forming a committee its findings and actions must be taken seriously if you have honest intention to address the root of the problem. Problem with the party is that it lacks spine to face it,” a senior Congress leader observed.

After the party lost Jamshedpur parliamentary by-election amid razing war of words and mutual distrust; state Congress in-charge Sakil Ahmed had appointed senior party leader KN Jha to submit report over unruly party leaders. Party sources told this newspaper Jha has already submitted report to the Congress leader. But it is not in sync with angry announcement of Ahmed at a press conference that the report will be the last nail in the coffin trouble makers in the party.

The one man committee headed by RC Khutiya to study the cause of the rout of the party in Jamshedpur has yet to prepare a draft or to invite an in-camera debate. Khutiya in Ranchi on Thursday gives an opportunity to ask whether he found the address of the trouble.