09-08-2006, 09:36 AM
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin--><b>Congress chief mum on hum </b>
Pioneer News Service | New Delhi
The conspicuous absence of Congress president Sonia Gandhi at an AICC function to celebrate 100 years of the party's adoption of Vande Mataram as a national song on Thursday left senior party leaders here red faced and fumbling for an explanation.Â
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh also did not attend the function organised by the All India Congress Seva Dal to mark the occasion.
In their absence, other AICC office-bearers dutifully went through the ritual of singing the national song after party treasurer Moti Lal Vora hoisted the national flag at the Seva Dal office at 26 Akbar Road, next to the AICC headquarters.
Union HRD Minister Arjun Singh, whose flip flop on the issue following opposition to singing the song by a handful of self-proclaimed Muslim leaders triggered off the unsavoury controversy, was the only senior member of the Government to grace the occasion.
The absence of Sonia and Manmohan Singh at the party function is bound to send wrong signals about the party's attitude toward the national song, which was sung throughout the nation on Thursday, conceded a Congress leader, on condition of anonymity.
<b>He pointed out that Sonia and Singh were not to be seen at any of the numerous official and non-official functions organised to celebrate the national song either.</b>
"The deliberate or inadvertent abstention of the top brass of the party and the Government from the celebrations will give the BJP a powerful weapon to claim that this was done with an eye on the minority vote bank," the Congress leader feared.
A sizable section of Congress leaders feels that the issue had been mishandled by the party and the Government ever since Arjun Singh publicly diluted a Central Government directive that the first two stanzas of Vande Mataram should be sung throughout the country by saying that it was not compulsory to sing the song.
Even after Singh had let the cat out of the bag, the party spokesman had all along claimed that it was the Congress that had adopted it as the national song at the Varanasi session of the party on September 7, 1905.
AICC general secretary Janardhan Dwivedi suggested that, "Perhaps she was not invited".
All India Congress Seva Dal chief Prahlah Yadav later tried to control the damage by pointing out that Sonia could not attend the function due to security reasons.
The police had set up its camps in the Seva Dal headquarters at 26 Akbar Road and there was not enough space in the premises, he claimed.
He also pointed out that <b>AICC general secretary Oscar Fernandes, who normally sends a note inviting the Congress president for such functions was not present in Delhi</b>.
"This should not be taken to mean that Soniaji deliberately avoided associating herself with Vande Mataram celebrations. She regularly attends AICC functions on Independence Day and the Republic Day when Vande Mataram is sung," he said somewhat lamely.
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Pioneer News Service | New Delhi
The conspicuous absence of Congress president Sonia Gandhi at an AICC function to celebrate 100 years of the party's adoption of Vande Mataram as a national song on Thursday left senior party leaders here red faced and fumbling for an explanation.Â
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh also did not attend the function organised by the All India Congress Seva Dal to mark the occasion.
In their absence, other AICC office-bearers dutifully went through the ritual of singing the national song after party treasurer Moti Lal Vora hoisted the national flag at the Seva Dal office at 26 Akbar Road, next to the AICC headquarters.
Union HRD Minister Arjun Singh, whose flip flop on the issue following opposition to singing the song by a handful of self-proclaimed Muslim leaders triggered off the unsavoury controversy, was the only senior member of the Government to grace the occasion.
The absence of Sonia and Manmohan Singh at the party function is bound to send wrong signals about the party's attitude toward the national song, which was sung throughout the nation on Thursday, conceded a Congress leader, on condition of anonymity.
<b>He pointed out that Sonia and Singh were not to be seen at any of the numerous official and non-official functions organised to celebrate the national song either.</b>
"The deliberate or inadvertent abstention of the top brass of the party and the Government from the celebrations will give the BJP a powerful weapon to claim that this was done with an eye on the minority vote bank," the Congress leader feared.
A sizable section of Congress leaders feels that the issue had been mishandled by the party and the Government ever since Arjun Singh publicly diluted a Central Government directive that the first two stanzas of Vande Mataram should be sung throughout the country by saying that it was not compulsory to sing the song.
Even after Singh had let the cat out of the bag, the party spokesman had all along claimed that it was the Congress that had adopted it as the national song at the Varanasi session of the party on September 7, 1905.
AICC general secretary Janardhan Dwivedi suggested that, "Perhaps she was not invited".
All India Congress Seva Dal chief Prahlah Yadav later tried to control the damage by pointing out that Sonia could not attend the function due to security reasons.
The police had set up its camps in the Seva Dal headquarters at 26 Akbar Road and there was not enough space in the premises, he claimed.
He also pointed out that <b>AICC general secretary Oscar Fernandes, who normally sends a note inviting the Congress president for such functions was not present in Delhi</b>.
"This should not be taken to mean that Soniaji deliberately avoided associating herself with Vande Mataram celebrations. She regularly attends AICC functions on Independence Day and the Republic Day when Vande Mataram is sung," he said somewhat lamely.
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