Bhopal: Congress veteran Kamal Nath is pegged to be the next chief of the party’s Madhya Pradesh unit, but incumbent Arun Yadav has claimed that there was no possibility of change of guard in the state.
Speaking to the media on Tuesday evening, Arun, a prominent OBC face in MP Congress and the son of former party veteran Subhash Yadav, said, “No one from Delhi is talking about changes.”
“I wish to make it clear that the party president Rahul Gandhi would be the face in Madhya Pradesh,” he claimed, adding who would lead would be decided by the party later on.
To endorse his stand, He has even released future plan for party’s Nyay Yatra being undertaken in different parts of the state.
Sources said that that Arun, being an OBC face with certain stature, is also nurturing aspirations of being the CM face to challenge CM Shivraj Singh Chouhan, who also hails from the same backward community.
They said that to negate his chances of leading the campaign the state, Congress seniors had lobbied hard to send him to Rajya Sabha but he backed out at the last moment. Meanwhile, given his junior stature in the party, he also failed to rein in factionalism in the party.
Meanwhile, talking to the media during a personal visit to Indore on Sunday, Nath took a u-turn on the question of the party’s CM face, saying the party at present needs many faces. Earlier, he had almost agreed to Jyotiraditya Scindia’s candidature.
“The party would come up with the CM face at appropriate time,” he said.
This comes after AICC general secretary Digvijaya Singh returned from his Narmada Parikrama. His ‘old friend’ Nath was first among MP leaders to greet him on the completion of his ‘spiritual’ journey. The two also were seen hugging each other during the completion ceremony in Narsinghpur.
Those in the know of political developments thereafter claim Singh, having reservations about Scindia, has backed Nath as the party chief in Madhya Pradesh.
The party could well appoint Scindia head of Congress election campaign committee, sources from Congress said. However if this is done, Scindia would turn into virtual CM candidate as he was projected in 2013 assembly polls.
The two-time Chief Minister, Singh has time and again wished to work for the party ahead of assembly polls while declining possibility of accepting any party post.
Sources, however, claimed that a decision on MP Congress unit could be made public soon after the Jan Akrosh rally to be held in New Delhi on April 29.
Comments
0 comment