IndiaPost.com - Cong hails Sonia's leadership; mum on PM candidate

NEW DELHI: The Congress hailed Sonia Gandhi's leadership as she completed ten years as party chief but steered clear of questions whether she would be its Prime Ministerial candidate in the next Lok Sabha polls.

"You can say anything. I have said nothing. Congress party will decide. Let us not jump on anything," party spokesman Abhishek Singhvi told reporters in reply to a question on the issue. Describing Gandhi as the party's "chief mascot", he said her son and AICC General Secretary Rahul Gandhi was "extremely important and charismatic leader" of the party.

Replying to another question, Singhvi downplayed reported plans of Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati to visit Etawah district when Rahul Gandhi is touring that district. In a democracy, everyone has the right to move anywhere, he said.

Advani's attack The BJP meanwhile took potshots at the party saying it has shackled itself to the "dynastic concept" that has "destroyed" its basic constitution. L K Advani, the saffron party's Prime Ministerial face, pilloried the Nehru-Gandhi family for what he described as its brazen appropriation of the Congress party and making it a "family fiefdom".

Addressing the India Today conclave, Advani also took a jibe at Prime Minister Manmohan Singh saying he has sympathy for him as the Congress president has become more powerful than him.

Dwelling on how does BJP's leadership differ from that of the Congress, he said "in the Congress party, for leadership there is reservation for members of a particular dynasty. No one else can" become a leader at the top.

"I sometimes feel depressed to see how brazenly an entire party has been appropriated and made into a family fiefdom and how slavishly Congressman have resigned themselves to this appropriation," he said.

"It is the saddest development in India's political evolution," he said on a day Gandhi achieved an unparalleled feat in the history of the Congress by completing ten years as its president.

The leaders of the BJP on the other hand, he said, have come from the common people who support the party and it never had a life-long President as the Congress does.