Subhas Chandra Pattanayak
The lady autocrat of Congress, Smt. Sonia Gandhi ousted Jayadev Jena from Presidentship of Orissa Pradesh Congress and gifted away the post to K.P.Singhdeo. Peoples of Orissa, specifically of the tribal dominated town of Baripada, have thrashed it down to dust in the urban elections immediately after the change.
The present Congress party, born out of Indira Congress, was once believed to be the Indian National Congress because of its support base in the grassroots.
At that time its emphasis was on upliftment of the peoples belonging to the Schedule Castes and Scheduled Tribes.
Smt. Indira Gandhi had tried to champion their cause. Administration had been made to draw up schemes prioritizing their upliftment.
Since her days, therefore, in different parts of India, specifically in Orissa, Congress had its strongest support base amongst the peoples belonging to these segments, who constitute the traditionally exploited class of India.
Jayadev Jena, a SC member of Orissa Assembly, belongs by birth to this traditionally exploited class whereas K.P.Singhdeo belongs to the traditionally exploiter class.
There were around 600 kings in India who constituted this traditionally exploiter class.
Aroused by new political awakening during the freedom movement, the traditionally exploited peoples had revolted against the kings so resolutely that to escape public wrath they had surrendered their kingship and had merged the areas under their hereditary grip with the independent Union of India.
But due to misconceived magnanimity of the first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru, specifically when propertied class and pro-rich elites had dominated his cabinet, these kings were granted privileges and privy purses even though that annulled the supreme sacrifices of the martyrs and the freedom fighters of the princely states.
Smt. Indira Gandhi had tried to amend this mistake and as she was trying to ingratiate herself to the exploited class to reach a bigger vote bank, she had obliterated the said privileges and privy purses given to those ex-kings.
Because of that specific action of Indira against the ex-kings, Congress, which was named after her, became popular amongst the SC and ST peoples and most of them adopted it as their own party and on the basis of their support that made Indira the leader of majority of Congress members, Indira Congress eventually bagged recognition as Indian National Congress.
So the present Congress owes its existence to Indira’s action against the ex-kings who constituted the traditionally exploiter class.
K.P.Singhdeo belongs to this class. He is the son of S.P.Singhdeo, ex-king of Dhenkanal, the land of exploitation that had given birth to the youngest martyr of India, Baji Raut (in these pages is posted on 6 October 2005 an elaborate discussion on him), who had sacrificed his life for freedom from the king and for end of exploitation.
Smt. Sonia Gandhi, Italian citizen by birth, whose acceptability in Indian politics comes only from her in-law relationship with Indira, has planted this K.P.Singhdeo as the President of Orissa Pradesh Congress after ousting Jayadev Jena from the post.
This raw shift of preference was so pregnant with contempt for the exploited class that Jena was not even offered due thanks for all the troubles he had taken up for keeping the discredited party alive in Orissa all these days.
Before the Municipal polls, after taking over the office, Singhdeo had been to Baripada in company of his co-President in the unconstitutional “Presidium” of Orissa Congress, L.B.Mohapatra and the “appointed” campaigner-in-Chief, Srikant Jena to campaign for Congress in the Municipal elections. To his personal satisfaction but to the embarrassment of the local citizens, he was introduced as the king of Dhenkanal.
Now voters of Baripada have given the reply. They have not wiped out the Congress. They have granted it life in only one ward out of 28, so that for the entire term the “aristocratic” party shall continue to test the ignominy of defeat.
The voters of Cuttack have also rejected the Congress. If anything it is a revengeful exercise of enfranchisement, because BJP that was holding the Mayor post, has been rejected except in two wards out of 54.
And, in this surge of revenge, the peoples of Cuttack city where Baji Raut and the entire group of his compatriots who were brutally killed by the armed forces of the king of Dhenkanal were consecrated to fire, have rejected the Congress, now as it is headed by the son of the same king.
This is so well defined that they have not hesitated to vote for BJD in order only to defeat the Congress.
The party of American lobbyists, having a man of the traditionally exploiter class as its mascot, has started the journey to doom from the soil of Orissa.