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Geetanjali Gayatri
Tribune News Service
Chandigarh, July 3
Even as resignations of Congress leaders holding various positions pour in to express solidarity with party president Rahul Gandhi and give him a free hand to restructure the party, Haryana State Congress chief Ashok Tanwar has chosen to remain silent on the development.
Though leaders of the rival camp had been gunning for him well before the party’s dismal performance in Haryana in the Lok Sabha elections, Tanwar has managed to dodge their pressure and stay in the saddle so far.
In response to the demand for his resignation from within the party, Tanwar, soon after the declaration of results of the parliamentary elections where the Congress drew a blank in Haryana, maintained that there was no question of him giving in to pressure and resigning from the post. He has stuck to his guns since then.
While he has been incommunicado since resignations of various office-bearers of the Congress began to come in, his close aide Tarun Bhandari, also the treasurer of the Haryana Pradesh Congress Committee, said the state chief had no reason to resign.
“Tanwar has met Congress president Rahul Gandhi thrice since the party debacle in the Lok Sabha. If the party top brass had even dropped a hint that he should resign, the state chief would have done so. The reality is that in states like Maharashtra and Haryana where Assembly elections are knocking on the door, no change is likely to happen and we will contest elections under the present state leadership,” he added.
The leaders of the rival camp led by former Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda claimed that the party had already lost two Lok Sabha elections and one Vidhan Sabha poll under Tanwar’s leadership. They said he had no moral ground to continue and should make way for a more “capable” leader.