Long considered rivals, a series of rapid political developments and their stars seem to have brought Jharkhand Congress president Pradeep Kumar Balmuchu and erstwhile Union Cabinet Minister Subodh Kant Sahay to a similar fate.

Advisory capacity is the role sections of the State Congress are now considering for the duo, rather than appointing either to head the party in proposed restructure of the State unit.

The idea got the desired impetus in the wake of two shifts in national politics of the Congress as well as UPA-II in the past week, when Sahay was dropped from the Cabinet and Balmuchu was denied a berth.

An ‘over-extended’ term for Balmuchu as State party president is going to expire this month and he is quite unlikely to be anointed afresh. Nonetheless, he is believed to have started a lateral negotiation with Central party bosses to allow him to head the party.

Removed from the Ministry, Sahay — who has of late started identifying himself as a ‘man meant for the organisation’ — has given thick hints as to where his interests chiefly lie now — State party and people.

Both Sahay and Balmuchu have publicly undertaken their commitment to serve the party. Both of them 

Advisory role on cards for Balmuchu, Sahay?

are speaking in guarded language, but with enough adjectives to give clues to their understated meaning and the message they want conveyed. “I had never been keen on a ministerial job and never lobbied for that. I will keep serving party and organisation, which is my top-most priority,” says Balmuchu.

If the Central Congress dropped Sahay and denied Balmuchu a berth, it was solely because it did not want a fresh bout of factionalism in the State unit since both are known for sponsoring blatant factionalism.

The section of the State party averse to the Balmuchu-Sahay tandem has made a fresh plea to Congress general secretary Rahul Gandhi. It wants him to help the party break fresh ground in Jharkhand and get fresh people in its ranks, rather than pressing for either of these two old boys, who are known for favouring kith and kin.

This non-cohesive and amoeba-like ‘third front’ consists chiefly of young MLAs and leaders like Banna Gupta, Geetashree Oraon, Sukhdeo Bhagat, Sarfaraz Ahmed and the likes, who consider themselves key flag-bearers of Rahul’s Mission Revive Jharkhand, for which Rahul visited Jharkhand in September. He returned with sufficient sense and reports that his party requires immediate housekeeping, with major surgery on its body politics.

“I had already told Rahulji about the precarious position of people like us. We are forced either to be in the Balmuchu camp or that of Sahayji. We believe an energetic leader — non-controversial and acceptable to all — should be appointed as the next president. One who will keep the party on the priority list,” Gupta notes. 

Though this close-knit group refrains from making explicit public statements that could court big brothers’ ire or lead to any disciplinary action, it has the support of many of Rahul’s confidantes.

However, they differ in one critical regard — whether the next president should be a tribal or non-tribal.

The Central Congress, which traditionally favours a tribal face to head the party in Jharkhand, will have a delicate task cut out since a section of the party is also pushing the idea of giving a non-tribal a chance.