Comment: Amarinder likely to go the Antony way

After the smooth and suave manner in which Congress President Sonia Gandhi ensured the resignation of Kerala Chief Minister A.K.Antony and made him pay for the total wipe out of the Congress in the state in the recent general elections, she is now eyeing on Punjab to perform a similar "surgery".

Like Antony, Punjab Chief Minister Capt. Amarinder Singh also has been a "problem child", for Sonia. Though he started off very well, after bringing the Congress back to power in the state, he has deviated and is faced with many charges of mal administration, vendetta against his own party men, apart from against Akali Dal leaders.

Rampant factionalism has also dented his image badly. The effect of it was seen in the recent Lok Sabha elections, where the Congress managed to win just two out of the 13 seats, compared to nine in the last Lok Sabha.

However, the problem for Sonia in Punjab is to find a suitable replacement to the Captain, who is able to carry on all the factions together, and also be able to provide a good and stable administration.

Though former state party chief Rajinder Kaur Bhattal, the bete noire of Amarinder, is spoiling for a shot at the chief ministership, observers of Punjab indicate that she would be the wrong choice. She would only exacerbate the factionalism in the party.

Sonia, meanwhile, has almost made it clear that she has no love lost anymore for Amarinder, who had to wait for three days last month for an appointment with her, and had to return disappointed. It is now only a matter of time before he will be shown the door.

Sonia has displayed tremendous patience and tact in dealing with the situation in Kerala. In fact, soon after the results of the Lok Sabha came out, she is said to have expressed her deep disappointment over it. However, she played the game of patience, when it came to getting rid of Antony.

If one goes by the pattern of her behaviour in such cases, she even kept Antony at bay like she did with Amarinder. However it went almost unnoticed. A couple of weeks, when the media was speculating about a reshuffle of the Antony cabinet, he was to come to Delhi to discuss it with her. However, she silently indicated through her Political Secretary Ahmed Patel, there is no need for him to come, and that is why Antony had to cancel the visit.

The writing on the wall was clear. But neither the media nor even the Kerala politicians were prepared to believe that the end of Antony is nearing. Even last week, more than a couple of senior Kerala MPs and leaders whom this correspondent spoke to, were all only talking of a cabinet reshuffle, but were not hopeful of Antony being sacked, though they had many complaints against him.

They all were only talking of the reshuffle after Sonia's visit to Kerala. Sonia however seems to have made up her mind much earlier, but had kept the decision to herself. She meticulously consulted all sections of the Congress as well as other United Democratic Front (UDF) partners over the last three months. She also in the meanwhile, cut the veteran leader K. Karunakaran to size by dropping him from the Congress Working Committee (CWC) and replacing his son K. Muralidharan from the state unit chief's post.

Having cut Karunakaran to size, her next task was to handle the Antony faction, and this she did without any fanfare or drama. Having performed this major surgery, Sonia now hopes that the three-decade long dominance of the two factions, which riddled Kerala politics, will come to an end.

Going by her style of functioning, Amarinder can also take the cue and may as well start packing his bags.

– Girish Nikam is an analyst on political affairs