Congress goes into damage control mode

The Congress party has gone into damage control mode by withdrawing the candidature of Jagdish Tytler and Sajjan Kumar from the upcoming Lok Sabha polls. Both Tytler and Kumar are accused in the 84 Anti-Sikh riots which had claimed the lives of more than 3000 Sikhs. This after the infamous shoe-gate incident involving journalist Jarnail Singh and Home Minister P Chidambaram had its ripple effect in the national capital and the state of Punjab.

The Congress High Command took the decision in a bid to calm down the sentiments among the Sikh community against the party. The Congress is also trying to prevent the BJP and The Akali Dal from hijacking this issue and making it their main stand in this coming elections considering Punjab sends 13 members to the Lok Sabha and out of the 7 Lok Sabha seats in Delhi the Sikh community is a major force in at least four.

This decision will come as a relief to many Congress leaders in Delhi including Chief Minister who was not happy with Tytler being granted a party ticket considering his dark past. Dixit felt the party should have been more sensitive towards the Sikhs who have a sizable vote share in Delhi. This is a moral victory for her as she was against the candidature of Tytler and Kumar right from the word go but had to bow down to her party’s pressure as both these man had won the last elections by huge margins.

Jagdish Tytler on his part maintains that he has been a victim of inner party politics and feels sad that he has caused so much embarrassment to his party. He added that there was no evidence against him and he has been made a victim by some of his party colleague and the media. He said both the Nanavati commission and the CBI had given him clean chit in the case.

The issue very unlikely to die down in the coming days and will surely be a major poll issue both in Punjab and Delhi. For the Congress which has been embarrassed just about a week before the first phase of polls it will be a though job replace Tytler and Kumar with winnable candidates and secondly build its image before the Sikh community in a short span of time.