The Congress, true to form, is assaulting those, within its borders, who deliver. The attack on Sheila Dikshit by Congress members is predictable, the only surprise being that they waited as long as they did to pull her down. Everyone knows who is saying and doing what and those playing to destabilize Dikshit are recognizable, known commodities, many involved in unsavoury activities. They represent the worst characters in Indian politics, with a privilege card for non-performance and without the ability to win a Lok Sabha or assembly election. Why they are in such exalted positions, god alone knows. The charges against Dikshit could be levied against almost all Congress people. If Dikshit has to go in this manner, she will get all the public support possible and, what could have been an ?anti-incumbency? vote next time, will, in her case, turn into victory for higher office. She should step down, expose their petty play, and fix them.

Indira Gandhi was the only Congresswoman who knew how to keep the loudmouthed non-doers in her party at bay. They were terrified of her imperious manner and fell into line much like emaciated mice. Most of them respect the danda. Gandhi comprehended well that insecure Congressmen always raised their voices in confrontation but if ignored, scurried to the party office with their tails between their legs. History has proven this character trait. After Rajiv Gandhi, these fellows could not get their act together and the single largest party was reduced to rubble by those very people. They could neither find a leader amongst themselves nor consolidate the party.

Of good and evil

It required Sonia Gandhi, the wife of Rajiv Gandhi and the daughter-in-law of Indira Gandhi, an Italian by birth, who had chosen to stay away from active politics, to step out and resurrect the diluted Congress. The local and central ?leaders? within the party were failed politicians, seen to be furthering their personal agendas at the cost of the party. It is because of that breed of Congressmen and women that the BJP-led NDA came to power. Enter Sonia Gandhi, who elegantly usurped the power from the BJP by reaching out to Indians across the board, giving them hope. The BJP was stunned by its radical fall in numbers. A battle won triumphantly by a woman who it claimed was incompetent and ?foreign?. India proved the BJP wrong.

Today, a year down the road, that same lot of failed Congressmen and women who betrayed the party and aided its dilution, are back in the saddle. They are strutting about as though they were never out of power. Their ineptitude, laced with large doses of arrogance, is nauseating. Fortunately, Manmohan Singh, the man at the helm, does not belong to this unacceptable breed. With time on their hands and no responsibility, those same Congressmen and women are now working relentlessly to do him in through intrigue ? la Congress and deception. Playing the role of Iago and indulging in superlative backbiting, these people are again killing the Congress?s chances of ruling both in the states and at the Centre. They are the death of the party that needs to be purged of such baggage, if it has to move into another age.

The positive ethos in the UPA is thanks to the Congress men and coalition partners who have a true commitment to this country and who are working hard without being distracted by the slimy shenanigans of their party colleagues who seem to be in cahoots with those who oppose the Congress and the UPA government. Typical of disgruntled old and middle-aged Congress people.

Will the party learn? Will it allow those who work, to work? Will the Congress president cease to tolerate the worst elements that besiege her party? Will the best and brightest defeat the evil elements?