NEW DELHI: His political career was “made by the Gandhis and unmade by the Gandhis,” said veteran Congress leader Mani Shankar Aiyar in an interview, while asserting his continued commitment to the party. He also lamented that for 10 years, he was not given the opportunity to meet Sonia Gandhi one-on-one or spend any meaningful time with Rahul Gandhi, except for once.
Reflecting on how he was “completely isolated in the party” even though he “had it all”, Aiyar, in an interview with PTI news agency on his forthcoming book ‘A Maverick in Politics’, however, strongly professed his commitment to his party. “I’ll never shift, and I will certainly not go to BJP,” he said.
Aiyar also reflected on crucial developments in 2012 when Sonia Gandhi fell very ill and former Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh had six bypasses. “So, we were crippled at the head of the govt and at the head of the party. But there was one man who was still full of energy, full of ideas, had a certain amount of charisma, and could have run either the party or the govt or even both. And that was Pranab Mukherjee,” Aiyar is quoted in the interview.
“If Manmohan Singh had become the President and Pranab had become the PM, I still think we would have lost in 2014 (Lok Sabha polls), but not by this massive humiliating defeat that we actually had, where we fell to 44 seats… ” Aiyar said.
Asked about the patronage from the Gandhis, the Congress veteran said, “I only had patronage. I had the favour of (former) prime minister Rajiv Gandhi. I then had the favour of Sonia Gandhi. But that’s a very, very uncertain basis on which to be in politics. So when Sonia Gandhi got angry with me in 2010, that patronage got withdrawn. And yet not completely withdrawn.” “So, it was a very slow decline. But it was a decline that took place over a period of about 15 years… ,” Aiyar said.
Aiyar, in the interview, goes on to detail several controversies, including the 2017 “neech” remark row and his subsequent suspension from the party. He narrates how his distance with the Gandhi family increased with that incident, saying one could date his fall precisely to Dec 7, 2017, when he had made the comment. He highlights that though the suspension was eventually revoked but the meeting with Rahul Gandhi did not materialise.
