NEW DELHI: Sharmistha Mukherjee, daughter of late President Pranab Mukherjee, on Thursday said Rahul Gandhi has had his chances in the Congress and the party needed to develop a new leadership.
In an interview to The Tribune after the government announced a memorial in the honour of Pranab Mukherjee and a Congress MP linked it to the late President’s 2018 RSS headquarters visit, Sharmistha said the Congress had become intolerant and antithetical to its own past ideology of debate and dialogue.
“I’m speaking from a position of anguish and frustration. I see the Congress going nowhere currently under the leadership of Rahul. Of course Mallikarjun Kharge is the Congress president, but we all know who is the party’s face. I was happy when the Congress won 99 seats in the Lok Sabha elections, but again, look what has happened in Maharashtra, in Haryana,” Sharmishtha, a former Congress leader, said. She had quit active politics in 2021 after having contested the 2015 Delhi polls against Saurabh Bhardwaj of AAP on the Congress ticket.
Slamming Congress MP Danish Ali for saying that the memorial for Pranab Mukherjee had been granted because he bowed his head at Nagpur, Sharmistha said the Congress had become “intolerant and habitual of hounding those who spoke their mind or criticised the leadership of the party”. She recalled being “hounded by Congress leaders after her book which mentioned Pranab Mukherjee’s adversarial remarks about Rahul”.
“I wrote an open letter to Rahul expressing my anguish, but no Congress leader condemned what was happening,” she recalled.
Sharmistha said she was extremely hurt and anguished that the Congress Working Committee had not formally condoled the passing of her father. “I was told the CWC did not condole the demise of Presidents since Presidents are above party politics, but my father’s diaries reveal the CWC had condoled the demise of former President KR Narayanan. In fact, my father had drafted that condolence resolution,” said Sharmishtha, who two days ago called on PM Narendra Modi and thanked him for announcing a memorial for Pranab Mukherjee even when the family had not asked for one.
Speaking about the Congress, Sharmistha asked if freedom of expression only meant praising the leaders.
“The Congress currently does not seem to have any direction or strategy. Even INDIA alliance partners are questioning the leadership of the Congress now. The issue is the moment you question the Congress, there is a problem,” she added.
Asked if she felt Rahul needed to take a step back, Sharmishtha, former national spokesperson and Delhi Mahila Congress chief said, “Of course. It is extremely important for the party to develop new leadership and Rahul had his chances. He has been the face of Congress since 2014 and has been in politics for longer.”
On the question as to who she would blame for the state of affairs in the party, Sharmistha said, “Ultimately the buck stops with the high command. And that is the Gandhi family.”
Speaking about the controversial issue of her late father’s 2018 RSS headquarter visit, Sharmistha said the credit for inviting Pranab Mukherjee to Nagpur went to the RSS because her father had advocated a ban on the RSS in one AICC session.
Regretting that she was upset with her father for accepting the RSS invitation, Sharmistha said he was only practicing the Congress tradition of dialogue.
“During that whole controversy I came to know that my father had actually in one AICC session advocated banning of RSS. So I would say that maybe in this context, the credit goes to RSS that they invited a person for their annual function who advocated its banning,” she said, ruling out returning to active politics. Sharmistha said she would not join any party.