Guwahati, June 8: At its first major huddle since former education minister Ripun Bora was arrested in Delhi while bribing a CBI official to hush up a murder case, the Congress decided two things today. First, not to give party nomination to any person with criminal charges in any election and second, embark on a massive face-saving campaign with help from Sonia Gandhi.

Chief minister Tarun Gogoi instructed his leaders to galvanise all their resources to ensure that the public rally to be addressed by the UPA chairperson during her visit to the state on June 13 is a great success.

The leaders laid out the strategy for the rally and also responsibilities.

They stressed the need for party workers and functionaries to be disciplined and not be provoked by the Opposition’s salvos since that would be counter-productive.

“Our strategy will be to make the rally a weapon to demonstrate that the Ripun Bora incident would not diminish our support and that people are still with us. All legislators have been asked to ensure that adequate number of people turn up for the rally from their respective constituencies,” a senior Congress legislator said.

Earlier in the day, government spokesperson Himanta Biswa Sarma said Bora’s arrest has robbed Gogoi of sleep as the incident has the potential to nullify all the “good works” of the government.

“The chief minister made it clear that no matter how important, powerful or efficient the person might be, if any charges were substantiated against him, he would not get the party ticket to contest elections,” the government spokesperson said.

Sarma quoted the chief minister as saying that the ministers and party leaders should now work with renewed vigour since the people would ultimately judge the government on the basis of its performance and not by one “black sheep” — if at all — in the family.

He said the Congress was even ready to support the Opposition if it moved the ethics committee of the Assembly against Bora, provided the sacked minister was not singled out for any action.

“There should be a general set of code of conduct for all the legislators. Unfortunately, there are so many Opposition members against whom there are ample number of charges, but the parties which are now making so much hue and cry are mum on those charges.”

He said there was no second instance of the promptness with which Gogoi sacked Bora.

“Within few hours of hearing the incident, even without giving Ripun Bora any chance to clarify his side of the story, he was dropped from the ministry.”