ThePrint reached Surjewala for comment over phone and text message. The report will be updated once a response is received.
While Chandra — a BJP-backed, independent candidate — defeated Anand to win the Rajya Sabha election from Haryana in 2016, Sharma won the 2022 Rajya Sabha election from the state by defeating the Congress’s Ajay Maken. The losses came despite the Congress having comfortable numbers in the Upper House on both occasions.
In the 2016 Rajya Sabha elections, 14 Congress votes polled in the Haryana assembly were declared invalid, 12 of them for using the wrong type of ink. Surjewala, then a Congress MLA, also had his vote rejected, as he had reportedly showed his vote to a fellow MLA.
In the 2022 election, Congress MLA Kuldeep Bishnoi “cross-voted”, while party leader Kiran Choudhary’s vote was reportedly found to be invalid. Choudhary has been the Tosham MLA in Haryana assembly since 2005. Last year, Maken moved the Punjab and Haryana High Court against Sharma’s victory.
Speaking to ThePrint, Sharma said that he didn’t want to respond to Krishnam’s allegations as he keeps away from such controversies. ThePrint has also reached Chandra and his personal assistant over phone and text message, the article will be updated once a response is received.
A two-time Congress Lok Sabha candidate — from Sambhal in 2014 and Lucknow in 2019 — Krishnam is possibly the only major Hindu religious leader who is part of the Congress’s UP unit.
Based in UP’s Sambhal, Krishnam is the founder of the Shri Kalki Foundation in UP’s Sambhal district. Some mythological accounts claim it to be the place where Kalki, the last of the Hindu deity Vishu’s avatars, would take birth.
In 2018, the Akhil Bhartiya Akhara Parishad had reportedly issued a list of allegedly fake religious leaders, which included Krishnam.
The leader is yet to prove his political mettle, having lost both Lok Sabha elections he fought, in 2014 and 2019, respectively. He has, however, been included among the Congress’s star campaigners in multiple elections and also been seen on television, espousing the party stand across issues.
Considered close to Madhya Pradesh Congress leader Digvijaya Singh, in January this year Krishnam hit out at his party’s “manager” as “old and irrelevant” over the issue of Opposition unity against the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in 2024 general elections.
His attacks on the party became more intense after his name did not feature in the list of the Congress Working Committee members, announced in August.
Last week, Krishnam alleged that “some leaders in the Congress only hate the Ram temple [being built in Ayodhya, and being touted by the BJP as a major achievement of the PM Modi government], but also [the Hindu deity] Ram.”
The Congress leader’s comments were in line with a statement made two months back, when he had alleged some leaders of the party were allergic to Hindu religion and the word “Hindu”.
When questioned about Krishnam’s comments, Surjewala, while speaking in poll-bound MP was quoted in the media as saying earlier this month, “You leave these nonsensical persons and look here, what does a several-kilometre long queue [of women supporters in Indore] tell you… this Diwali will belong to the Congress)”.
In response, Krishnam took to his ‘X’ [previously Twitter] account Sunday to target Surjewala, alleging that it was “a misfortune for the Congress” that such “lafandar [loafer]” has been made the general secretary of the party, who as an MLA “committed the sin” of helping Chandra win the Rajya Sabha election in 2016, “only to stop an obscene CD from becoming public”.
कांग्रेस के “भाग्य”
की विडंबना यही है कि एक ऐसे “लफ़ंडर”
को पार्टी का महासचिव बना रखा है जिसने राज्य सभा के चुनाव में “विधायक” रहते हुए भाजपा के उम्मीदवार और Zee न्यूज़ के मालिक सुभाष चंद्रा को जितवाने का “पाप” सिर्फ़ एक “अश्लील”
CD के “प्रसारण” को रुकवाने के लिये किया. https://t.co/uwgdDOQ9RZ— Acharya Pramod (@AcharyaPramodk) November 12, 2023
As the BJP’s Sudhanshu Trivedi Saturday targeted the Congress quoting Krishnam, the latter wrote in another social media post that his party had a “chandal chaukadi [devilish quartet]” which hated not only [the deity] Ram, but also the cow [revered by many Hindus], the holy Ganga, Gita (a text sacred to the Hindus) and the gayatri (Vaidik mantra).
In conversation with ThePrint days later, Krishnam also accused Surjewala of misleading party workers after Rahul Gandhi’s resignation as Congress president in 2019 and blamed him for making media house “enemies of the party” during his tenure as the party’s media in-charge.
He also claimed Priyanka Gandhi to be the “most popular” Congress leader, pushing for her being named as “prime ministerial candidate” of the Opposition bloc against the BJP for the 2024 election.
The Congress leader, however, dismissed allusions that his speaking up against the party indicated towards a possible shift to the BJP, claiming them to be “rumours being spread by the Congress coterie”.
Also read: ‘Which was the rebellion?’ Sachin Pilot compares his actions to Gehlot camp’s 2022 ‘revolt’
‘Surjewala misled party workers post Rahul’s resignation’
Talking about the time following Rahul’s resignation as Congress president, following the party’s debacle in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, Krishnam alleged while the Congress presidents kept changing, “the coterie of the leadership remained the same… that coterie is responsible for taking the Congress to the verge of destruction over the past eight-ten years.”
Krishnam added: “When Rahul Gandhi ji resigned from party presidentship in 2019, he made such a big sacrifice. He said that neither he nor anyone from his family will become president and it will be an outsider from hence forth. That decision should have been hailed, but a mockery was made of it.”
He also accused Surjewala of misinforming supporters of Rahul’s decision.
“Surjewala was the party’s media in-charge at the time. He kept giving misinformation to supporters and for a year, Congress workers were told that Rahul Gandhi is withdrawing his resignation…that he is upset and is being persuaded to withdraw resignation. This sent a very wrong message to the public,” Krishnam claimed.
He further said that purported assurances that Rahul Gandhi was being persuaded to withdraw his resignation, suggested that he was a “upset like a child” rather than that he was a “solid leader”.
“Rahul Gandhi ji too had indicated that he was pained that none from the working committee or the AICC had resigned after his resignation. While he tried to establish principles, the coterie showed its loyalty only for their posts. Those who never fought elections are taking decisions about who will fight,” Krishnam alleged.
He also claimed that all Congress workers genuinely supporting Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi were “being targeted by the coterie around the leadership”.
Hitting out at Surjewala, he said, “He [Surjewala] was handling the post of the Congress’s media in-charge for seven-eight years. In all these years, who is responsible for making the media houses the enemies of the Congress…. those journalists who would once sing praises of the Congress…who is responsible for this?”
Surjewala was replaced by Jairam Ramesh as Congress’s media in-charge last year.
Call for Priyanka to be declared as PM candidate
While several senior Congress leaders including former MP Chief Minister Kamal Nath, Chhattisgarh CM Bhupesh Baghel and Rajasthan CM Ashok Gehlot have batted for Rahul Gandhi to be declared the party’s prime ministerial candidate for 2024, Krishnam claimed Priyanka Gandhi to the most popular leader in the party.
“If Rahul Gandhi is declared the prime ministerial candidate I will be very happy, but Priyanka Gandhi is the most popular leader of the party. If he doesn’t want to be [PM], the opposition should declare Priyanka Gandhi as a joint prime ministerial candidate. Earlier too, he [Rahul] didn’t want to be the party president,” said Krishnam, who is also a part of the advisory council to Priyanka Gandhi.
Krishnam further claimed that there were leaders in the Congress who were allergic to religion and wanted to disrespect religious leaders, and alleged it to be moving away from the path of Mahatma Gandhi to that of (Communist leader) Karl Marx.
Congress insiders claimed, however, that Krishnam was upset at not being made a working committee member.
“Krishnam did not find mention in the new list of working committee members declared in August. He has also been excluded from the party’s star campaigners list. He is trying to remain in limelight and suggest that he is still relevant. He like many other leaders are keeping their cards close to their chests till 3 December [when results to assembly election in five states will be declared]. If the party forms a government in more than two states, such leaders will hang on to the party else they will explore other options,” a UPCC member told ThePrint.
Responding to such allegations, Krishnam said, “Is talking about Ram a signal that someone will join the BJP? Is talking about Vande Mataram, bhagwa (saffron colour) a signal that someone is bhajpai (BJP supporter). If yes, then, founder of Congress Mahatma Gandhi was the biggest bhajpai because all his verses would start with Raghupati Raghav Raja Ram.”
He further contended that he would fight next year’s Lok Sabha elections as a Congress candidate if the party wanted him to.
(Edited by Poulomi Banerjee)
Also read: ‘BJP doesn’t have a patent on Ram’ — Congress’s ‘Hanuman’ hopes to trounce Shivraj in MP’s Budhni