Not easy to forgive Jaganmohan: Congress leaders

NEW DELHI - Congress leaders say Kadapa MP Y.S. Jaganmohan Reddy, whose TV channel attacked party chief Sonia Gandhi and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, is a person of “no consequence” and his ouster will be less harmful than his staying on.

“He has done something which is not easily forgivable and the high command will take the final decision,” Congress leader K. Keshav Rao told reporters outside parliament.

“As far as I am concerned we don’t take him as a man of consequence,” he said.

A programme aired Friday and Saturday by Sakshi TV channel, owned by Jaganmohan Reddy, blamed Gandhi for the “sorry state of affairs in the Congress” and called Prime Minister Manmohan Singh a “rubber stamp”.

Son of late Andhra Pradesh chief minister Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy, Jagan has been rebelling against the party high command ever since K. Rosaiah was made chief minister following his father’s death in a helicopter crash last year.

Rao said that Jagan was trying to be a hero through these acts of rebellion.

“By doing this he thinks he has become a hero, if he is removed he becomes a martyr,” Rao said.

“This is not the first time that the boy is revolting… he had done it earlier when he defied orders of Madam (Sonia Gandhi)…not only this he had issued a protest letter, an open letter. He had also used some sentences which were a slap on the high command’s face,” he added.

Another senior Congress leader from Andhra Pradesh said: “Jagan has always been a rebel, perhaps his ouster will be less harmful than his continuation in the party.”

Admitting that Jagan may float his own party if removed from the Congress, the party leader said that though it will have a negative impact on the party, his continuation may have worse effects.

“Of course if he floats a party it will cut into our vote bank, but what he is doing is worse for the party,” he said.