Loyalist to insurgent: Ghulam Nabi Azad’s journey in Congress
9 min readBy PTI
Veteran Congressman Ghulam Nabi Azad, a relentless fixture within the organisation’s decision-making course of because the tumultuous occasions of Emergency, lastly fell out together with his mom social gathering on Friday after a not-so-smooth relationship with the highest brass prior to now couple of years.
“The situation has become irretrievable,” Azad, 73, mentioned in his parting shot to Sonia Gandhi, whose trusted confidante he remained proper from the time of Sitaram Kesri’s unceremonious exit because the social gathering’s chief in 2000.
Known for his capability to barter the difficult twists and turns of physique politic, Azad was typically despatched by the management to firefight any scenario – be it a disaster in a faction-ridden state unit like Haryana or cobble up a brand new alliance and authorities in Karnataka with the JDS.
But issues had been by no means the identical between Azad and Gandhi after the summer time of 2020 when he headed the ‘group of 23’, looking for management and organisational change.
Observers say the connection broke irretrievably after the Congress chief denied Azad, the sitting chief of opposition in Rajya Sabha, a renomination to the higher home final 12 months.
Many an eyebrow had been raised when Prime Minister Narendra Modi profusely praised Azad whereas delivering an emotional speech in the course of the Congress chief’s farewell in Rajya Sabha in 2021.
In return, Azad was additionally effusive in his reward for Modi. Again Congress didn’t take it simply when the Modi authorities conferred the Padma Bhushan on Azad.
Senior leaders referred to as it a political resolution and never one on benefit.
ALSO READ | Key factors from Ghulam Nabi Azad’s letter of resignation from Congress
And very just lately, Azad resigned from the publish of head of the Jammu and Kashmir Congress marketing campaign committee hours after he was appointed. The writing was on the wall since then.
Azad’s exit was concurrently a shock and a shock to sections throughout the Congress, contemplating he was a key determine within the social gathering’s decision-making processes by way of the Sanjay Gandhi days and the tumultuous occasions of the Emergency underneath Indira Gandhi, adopted by the Rajiv Gandhi period, the Narasimha Rao interval and ultimately the tenure of the longest serving Congress president Sonia Gandhi.
Born in 1949 in Soti village of Bhadarwah in Jammu and Kashmir’s Doda district, Azad made his method up the ladder within the Congress and went on to turn out to be the chief minister of his dwelling state in 2006.
In his virtually 50 years in politics, he has been a two-term Lok Sabha and a five-term Rajya Sabha member, apart from occupying all high Congress positions and a union minister in all Congress governments since 1982.
He additionally remained a two-term member of J&Ok Legislative Assembly in 2006 and 2008.
Many Congress leaders time period Azad’s transfer as an “outright betrayal”, even because the outdated warhorse stored each his supporters and critics guessing about his future strikes following his resignation from all Congress posts at present.
ALSO READ | GNA’s DNA has been ‘Modi-fied’: Congress’ Jairam Ramesh on Ghulam Nabi Azad
“Some of my other colleagues and I will now persevere to perpetuate the ideals for which we have dedicated our entire adult lives outside the formal fold of the Indian National Congress,” mentioned the previous chief minister of Jammu and Kashmir, who seems set for recent innings within the Union Territory the place the election course of has begun with the finalisation of the electoral rolls.
Azad’s title shall be etched in Congress historical past as a quintessential insurgent who raised a banner of revolt towards the formidable first household of the Congress and even managed to carry 23 leaders collectively in a bunch referred to as G23.
The G23, dissenters to some, most popular to name itself the reformist panel which sought significant organisational overhaul, an advisory function for the Gandhis and new full-time social gathering chief.
The letter G23 wrote to Sonia Gandhi in August 2020, underneath the management of Azad, laid the bottom for the previous minister’s eventual divorce from the social gathering at present.
Azad entered the political fray as secretary of the Block Congress Committee in Bhalessa in Jammu and Kashmir from 1973 to 1975 and moved up the ranks to turn out to be the president of the J&Ok Youth Congress in 1975-76.
He gained his first parliamentary election in 1980 from Washim in Maharashtra and have become a minister on the Centre underneath Indira Gandhi in 1982.
He later served underneath all Congress prime ministers – Rajiv Gandhi, Narasimha Rao and Manmohan Singh.
Azad was first given a Rajya Sabha ticket in June 1991.
Azad mentioned he joined the Indian National Congress in Jammu & Kashmir in mid-Nineteen Seventies when it was nonetheless a taboo to be related to the social gathering given its chequered historical past within the state from August 8, 1953, onwards the arrest of Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah being the nadir of its “political myopia”.
ALSO READ | Exits of Ghulam Nabi Azad, Kapil Sibal go away G-23 change seekers in disarray
He mentioned he was impressed by the beliefs of Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Lal Nehru, Sardar Patel, Maulana Abul Kalam Azad, Subhash Chandra Bose and different main lights of the liberty wrestle from his pupil days and joined the social gathering on the private insistence of Sanjay Gandhi.
From 1977 onwards he was normal secretary of the Indian Youth Congress (IYC) led by Late Sanjay Gandhi and went to jail a number of occasions, his longest interval in Tihar jail being from December 20, 1978, to finish of January 1979.
After Sanjay’s demise, he took over because the National President of IYC in 1980 and had the privilege of inducting Rajiv Gandhi into the Indian Youth Congress as a Member of the National Council on Sanjay Gandhi’s first loss of life anniversary on June 23, 1981.
Azad additionally served as AICC normal secretary with each president of the Congress because the mid-Nineteen Eighties and was a member of the Congress Parliamentary Board headed by Rajiv Gandhi until his loss of life in May 1991 and later with Rao until the latter determined to not reconstitute the Congress Parliamentary Board in October 1992.
He was additionally a member of the Congress Working Committee, the best decision-making physique of the Congress, repeatedly for practically 4 many years each in an elected and a nominated capability and served as AICC normal secretary in-charge of each state and Union Territory of the nation at one level of time or the opposite during the last 35 years.
Azad claimed that he gained 90 per cent of states that he was in-charge every so often and eventually served because the Leader of the Opposition within the Rajya Sabha for seven years.
Veteran Congressman Ghulam Nabi Azad, a relentless fixture within the organisation’s decision-making course of because the tumultuous occasions of Emergency, lastly fell out together with his mom social gathering on Friday after a not-so-smooth relationship with the highest brass prior to now couple of years.
“The situation has become irretrievable,” Azad, 73, mentioned in his parting shot to Sonia Gandhi, whose trusted confidante he remained proper from the time of Sitaram Kesri’s unceremonious exit because the social gathering’s chief in 2000.
Known for his capability to barter the difficult twists and turns of physique politic, Azad was typically despatched by the management to firefight any scenario – be it a disaster in a faction-ridden state unit like Haryana or cobble up a brand new alliance and authorities in Karnataka with the JDS.
But issues had been by no means the identical between Azad and Gandhi after the summer time of 2020 when he headed the ‘group of 23’, looking for management and organisational change.
Observers say the connection broke irretrievably after the Congress chief denied Azad, the sitting chief of opposition in Rajya Sabha, a renomination to the higher home final 12 months.
Many an eyebrow had been raised when Prime Minister Narendra Modi profusely praised Azad whereas delivering an emotional speech in the course of the Congress chief’s farewell in Rajya Sabha in 2021.
In return, Azad was additionally effusive in his reward for Modi. Again Congress didn’t take it simply when the Modi authorities conferred the Padma Bhushan on Azad.
Senior leaders referred to as it a political resolution and never one on benefit.
ALSO READ | Key factors from Ghulam Nabi Azad’s letter of resignation from Congress
And very just lately, Azad resigned from the publish of head of the Jammu and Kashmir Congress marketing campaign committee hours after he was appointed. The writing was on the wall since then.
Azad’s exit was concurrently a shock and a shock to sections throughout the Congress, contemplating he was a key determine within the social gathering’s decision-making processes by way of the Sanjay Gandhi days and the tumultuous occasions of the Emergency underneath Indira Gandhi, adopted by the Rajiv Gandhi period, the Narasimha Rao interval and ultimately the tenure of the longest serving Congress president Sonia Gandhi.
Born in 1949 in Soti village of Bhadarwah in Jammu and Kashmir’s Doda district, Azad made his method up the ladder within the Congress and went on to turn out to be the chief minister of his dwelling state in 2006.
In his virtually 50 years in politics, he has been a two-term Lok Sabha and a five-term Rajya Sabha member, apart from occupying all high Congress positions and a union minister in all Congress governments since 1982.
He additionally remained a two-term member of J&Ok Legislative Assembly in 2006 and 2008.
Many Congress leaders time period Azad’s transfer as an “outright betrayal”, even because the outdated warhorse stored each his supporters and critics guessing about his future strikes following his resignation from all Congress posts at present.
ALSO READ | GNA’s DNA has been ‘Modi-fied’: Congress’ Jairam Ramesh on Ghulam Nabi Azad
“Some of my other colleagues and I will now persevere to perpetuate the ideals for which we have dedicated our entire adult lives outside the formal fold of the Indian National Congress,” mentioned the previous chief minister of Jammu and Kashmir, who seems set for recent innings within the Union Territory the place the election course of has begun with the finalisation of the electoral rolls.
Azad’s title shall be etched in Congress historical past as a quintessential insurgent who raised a banner of revolt towards the formidable first household of the Congress and even managed to carry 23 leaders collectively in a bunch referred to as G23.
The G23, dissenters to some, most popular to name itself the reformist panel which sought significant organisational overhaul, an advisory function for the Gandhis and new full-time social gathering chief.
The letter G23 wrote to Sonia Gandhi in August 2020, underneath the management of Azad, laid the bottom for the previous minister’s eventual divorce from the social gathering at present.
Azad entered the political fray as secretary of the Block Congress Committee in Bhalessa in Jammu and Kashmir from 1973 to 1975 and moved up the ranks to turn out to be the president of the J&Ok Youth Congress in 1975-76.
He gained his first parliamentary election in 1980 from Washim in Maharashtra and have become a minister on the Centre underneath Indira Gandhi in 1982.
He later served underneath all Congress prime ministers – Rajiv Gandhi, Narasimha Rao and Manmohan Singh.
Azad was first given a Rajya Sabha ticket in June 1991.
Azad mentioned he joined the Indian National Congress in Jammu & Kashmir in mid-Nineteen Seventies when it was nonetheless a taboo to be related to the social gathering given its chequered historical past within the state from August 8, 1953, onwards the arrest of Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah being the nadir of its “political myopia”.
ALSO READ | Exits of Ghulam Nabi Azad, Kapil Sibal go away G-23 change seekers in disarray
He mentioned he was impressed by the beliefs of Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Lal Nehru, Sardar Patel, Maulana Abul Kalam Azad, Subhash Chandra Bose and different main lights of the liberty wrestle from his pupil days and joined the social gathering on the private insistence of Sanjay Gandhi.
From 1977 onwards he was normal secretary of the Indian Youth Congress (IYC) led by Late Sanjay Gandhi and went to jail a number of occasions, his longest interval in Tihar jail being from December 20, 1978, to finish of January 1979.
After Sanjay’s demise, he took over because the National President of IYC in 1980 and had the privilege of inducting Rajiv Gandhi into the Indian Youth Congress as a Member of the National Council on Sanjay Gandhi’s first loss of life anniversary on June 23, 1981.
Azad additionally served as AICC normal secretary with each president of the Congress because the mid-Nineteen Eighties and was a member of the Congress Parliamentary Board headed by Rajiv Gandhi until his loss of life in May 1991 and later with Rao until the latter determined to not reconstitute the Congress Parliamentary Board in October 1992.
He was additionally a member of the Congress Working Committee, the best decision-making physique of the Congress, repeatedly for practically 4 many years each in an elected and a nominated capability and served as AICC normal secretary in-charge of each state and Union Territory of the nation at one level of time or the opposite during the last 35 years.
Azad claimed that he gained 90 per cent of states that he was in-charge every so often and eventually served because the Leader of the Opposition within the Rajya Sabha for seven years.
