Why changing goalposts, Khurshid asks Azad-led G-23 in open letter

Aditi Tandon

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, March 3

Disquiet is growing in the Congress over public stances taken by G-23 led by veteran Ghulam Nabi Azad with former minister Salman Khurshid on Wednesday asking the letter writers why they were changing goal posts and urging them to consider how they would be judged by history.

In some plainspeak to Azad and former ministers Anand Sharma and Kapil Sibal, Khurshid asked if it was fair to kick the very ladder one has used to climb up in life.

“We thought the G-23 made their point and were informed that party elections will be held when appropriate, something they agreed to in their interaction with the Congress President and later at the CWC. But are they changing the goal posts once again with the public display of disquiet or reservations in Jammu and as we are being told, very soon in Haryana?” asked Khurshid telling the G-23 that even the unrewarded, unknown Congress workers cared about democracy.

Khurshid quoted US President John Kennedy and said to G-23, “Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country (read party).”

He also asked them if it was honourable to be asking what share anyone would have in the India of tomorrow and what credit the party would give us?

“Just as the names of national martyrs are engraved on India Gate, there are records in the Congress office where innumerable names are embossed as part of our history. For most of us that is enough recognition,” said the former law minister days after Sharma and Sibal said the party was weakening.

Noting that sacrifices could not come with preconditions, Khurshid added, “There are two ways of spending the current dark moments—to count our blessings and the moments of joy and comfort our party has given to us; or else to wing about what we did not receive. If we choose the latter what conviction will we carry with the innumerable workers who continue to hope that the darkness will give way? Besides how will we be judged by history?”

He also said the growing dark footprint of communal forces had pushed the Congress into forced errors where it shies away from speaking about minorities and puts on a public display of identifying with the cultural symbols of the majority that have largely been appropriated by the BJP.

He asked the G-23 “it is a relevant question whether it is fair to kick the very ladder you have climbed to the top storey of life from where making speeches is easy.”

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