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Congress officials, 4 CMs 'quit'

Several Congress officials including general secretaries and Congress Working Committee members have offered to quit to pressurise Sonia Gandhi to withdraw her resignation as Congress president.

Four Congress chief ministers -- Digvijay Singh (Madhya Pradesh), Shiela Dikshit (Delhi), Ashok Gehlot (Rajasthan) and Giridhar Gamang (Orissa) -- also submitted their resignation letters to Sonia.

The chief ministers demanded the immediate expulsion of the three Congress Working Committee members -- Sharad Pawar, P A Sangma and Tariq Anwar -- who questioned her projection as the party's prime ministerial candidate.

The CWC members who put in their papers today include Pranab Mukherjee, Oscar Fernandes, Gulam Nabi Azad, Sushil Kumar Shinde, R K Dhawan and Ambika Soni.

Jitendra Prasada also announced his resignation from the party, stating that the party had no future without the leadership of Sonia.

Leaders of several Congress frontal organisations also submitted their resignation letters to Sonia. They include Mahila Congress president Chandresh Kumari, Seva Ddal chief Suresh Pachouri, Youth Congress president Manish Tiwari and National Students Union of India president Meenakshi Natrajan.

At a joint media conference in New Delhi, the chief ministers said they had met Sonia this morning and told her that they could not continue in their posts if she did not withdraw her resignation.

''We won the assembly elections last year because of her and not because of our own strength... There is no point in continuing in office if she does not withdraw her resignation,'' Singh said.

He said Sonia was the party's obvious PM choice, having revived the party's fortunes and lead it to an unprecedented victory in the last elections.

He said the three CWC members had in fact reflected the Bharatiya Janata Party's view. ''It is our unequivocal demand that they should be expelled from the party.''

He said the CWC had already discussed and rejected the three dissenters' demand that the party include in its manifesto an amendment to the Constitution of India that the three highest offices in the country should be held by natural-born Indian citizens.

''We hope that the three members would abide by the CWC decision. If they don't, it will amount to an act of indiscipline.''

Rejecting the allegations that Sonia's resignation was a drama, Singh said it was those who had questioned her position as the party's prime ministerial candidate who were enacting a drama.

He said it had already been proved that the foreign origin issue did not cut ice with the electorate.

The BJP had raised the 'Rome raj or Ram raj' slogan in the past elections but the Congress had done well, he said.

He recalled that Pawar himself had publicly stated after the fall of the Atal Bihari Vajpayee government that Sonia was the party's prime ministerial candidate. Also, when she was elected Congress president no one said anything.

Dikshit said the Congress rank and file was extremely distressed by the behaviour of the three CWC members who were putting forth the BJP's views.

''This is just not acceptable. Mrs Gandhi led the party to a historic and glorious victory and rejuvenated the organisation.''

Maintaining that the fortunes of India and the party were intertwined, the CMs said in a joint statement, ''The three CWC members' act, treacherous in character and spirit, was aimed at weakening the nation by rendering it in the hands of divisive forces against which the Gandhi family lived and died.''

The Congress Working Committee has already rejected her resignation.

In case she does not accept their demand, the chief ministers have sought her permission to resign from their posts.

Meanwhile, the Congress headquarters and the adjacent residence of the party president in New Delhi witnessed hectic political activity with scores of party workers protesting against Sonia's resignation.

UNI

UNI

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