Show of strength by Cong ticket aspirants at Fatehpur
Our Correspondent
Nurpur, August 3
Congress activists put up a united show of strength at Fatehpur in Kangra district last evening to pressurise the party leadership to field a ground-level worker in the forthcoming byelection. The factionalism and infighting in the Congress came to the fore when local leaders Reeta Gularia, Nashwar Singh, Chetan Chambiyal and Raghav Pathania assembled at Raja ka Talab with a large number of supporters and organised a roadshow comprising hundreds of four-wheelers and two-wheelers up to Fatehpur.
After the show of strength, these leaders addressed a workers’ rally. They said the party should not field a parachute candidate in the Fatehpur Assembly byelection. They rejected familism and appealed to the party leadership to give the ticket to a ground-level worker and not to weaken the Congress by fielding an outside candidate.
These leaders, who are also ticket claimants, have been opposing the candidature of Bhawani Singh Pathania ever since the party leadership started seriously considering to field him in the byelection after the demise of his father and Fatehpur MLA Sujan Singh Pathania.
In-charge of Congress affairs Rajiv Shukla had formed a committee headed by former Rajya Sabha member Viplove Thakur last month to meet the dissident groups and evolve a consensus before the party candidate for the Fatehpur byelection was announced officially. But yesterday’s show of strength organised by the dissidents indicated that the committee had failed to deter these leaders from expressing their dissidence openly and raising their voice against Bhawani Pathania.
Meanwhile, Viplove Thakur said that such a show was of no significance and merely a pressure tactic for getting party ticket.
