Mir Farhat
Srinagar, Nov 7: Factionalism in the State Pradesh Congress Committee came into open today at Congress Headquarters some moments before Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi was to address the PCC workers.
The cracks became visible when a youth member, Abid Kashmiri, “praised” PCC president Saif-ud-Din Soz and Sham Lal Sharma, Minister for Public Health Engineering during his two-minute speech to the workers, and didn’t mention anything about Union Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad or Taj Mohi-ud-Din, Minister for Medical Education.
Irked by the young member’s “praise” for Soz faction only, some workers, seemingly supporters of Taj, rose up form their chairs and chanted slogans in favour of Taj.
Yelling “shame, shame, shame”, the pro-Azad and Taj supporters laughed at the young member, whose speech was immediately cut short by PCC state Vice President Muzzafar Parray, sensing that the rally would get disrupted.
Parray said: “Those workers are not successful who go by their emotions.”
To douse the factionalism air, Parray then requested Taj to come on the stage to address the workers.
Taj in his speech cautioned the workers not to create indiscipline in the rally.
To divert the warring workers’ attention, Taj also cracked many jokes on stage which took the workers by laughter.
Parray, while calling PCC members to address the workers before Rahul Gandhi’s arrival to the Headquarters, repeatedly asked them not to talk about “those things” which would create division within the party.
PCC has been rattled by divisions within, with one Congress faction, led by PCC chief Saif-ud-Din Soz, at loggerheads with the other, led by Union Health Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad for the last several years.
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