Jairam Ramesh: Don’t know whether there will be Cong prez poll

Gundlupet (Karnataka):  Congress Communication In-charge Jairam Ramesh on Friday said it is not known whether there would be an election to the post of party president on October 17 because the last date of withdrawal is still not over.
“It is a contest between two multidimensional personalities (Mallikarjun Kharge and Sashi Tharoor). The last date of withdrawal is still not over. We don’t know whether there will be an election on October 17 or not,” he told reporters addressing a press conference after the ‘Bharat Jodo Yatra’ entered Karnataka at Gundlupet from Tamil Nadu’s Gudalur here.
Both Kharge and Tharoor have filed nominations to contest the Congress party president’s post. The election will be held on October 17.
If elections are happening, it is part of a democratic politics, Ramesh said, adding that the Congress is the only political party which has a system for electing its president. No other political party in India has this system, he said.
“It has actually elected party presidents. In 137 years, the president was elected in 1939, 1950, 1997 and 2000. The Congress’ greatest contribution to Indian politics has been the idea of consensus which was popularized by Kamaraj in 1964 to select the successor to Jawahar Lal Nehru.
“This was the model Kamraj used to select the successor to Lal Bahadur Shastri, but if consensus is not possible for some reason, then we will have elections. We are the only party which has independent election authority. Mr. Madhusudan Mistry is as fearsome as TN Seshan. Every voter in this election has a QR bar-coded ID card,” he said.
There are 9,000 PCC delegates who will vote on the basis of voter ID cards like Aadhaar cards, he said. The election, however, is only a sideshow, the only thing relevant is the Bharat Jodo Yatra, which is transforming Indian politics, Ramesh said.
“Bharat Jodo Yatra is a mass contact program of the Congress party. It is transforming the party and individuals who are involved in it. It is transforming Indian politics,” he said.
Replying to a query, Ramesh said as a designated party leader he cannot abuse his position to make comments on either Kharge or Tharoor who are contesting the election to party president’s post.
On yet another question, Ramesh said the yatra has forced both BJP and RSS on the backfoot and made them nervous, because a new Rahul Gandhi has emerged and a new Congress party has emerged.
He informed that Rahul Gandhi along with other yatris will be interacting every day with various civil society groups.