The Congress Party finds itself in a piquant position where, in a short span of about a week, three of its senior leaders are at the centre of an unsavoury controversy, each of their own making.
First, Mr Salman Khurshid, an eminent member of Mrs Sonia Gandhi's core team, while addressing an audience in Pakistan, alluded towards India not reciprocating Pakistan's hand of friendship and peace. With one sentence, Mr Khurshid ended up turning India's official position literally on its head, disregarding and dismissing the brazenness with which agencies of the Pakistani establishment actively use terrorism as an instrument of state policy against India.
Coming from a former Minister of External Affairs, this comment was even more unexpected. It also clashed with the public stance of the Congress party itself, which has consistently demanded answers and action from the Government of India on anything involving Pakistan including ceasefire violations.
Even as public discourse on Mr Khurshid's comment was building up, another senior Congress leader Mr Mani Shankar Aiyar came up with a shocker. In response to a question on Pakistani Television, on how relations between India and Pakistan could improve, he said -
"Inko Hataye, Humko Laiye (dislodge the BJP government and help bring back the Congress party)". Not unexpectedly, public outrage was sparked. Reactions were instantaneous and acrimonious. Some considered this comment an act of treason, amounting to sedition.
To complete the trilogy of controversial comments, Mr Shakeel Ahmad, yet another senior Congress leader tweeted, "Thankfully Chhota Rajan & Anup Chetia (ULFA) are not Muslims. Had they been Muslims Modi govt would have a different narrative altogether" (sic). Mr Ahmad's clarification appeared worse than the original sin when he went on to state that "Had they been Muslims, the BJP would have said that Congress government or UPA government did not arrest them and did not bring them back to the country simply because they were Muslims. They would have said that the Congress and UPA were thus trying to do vote-bank politics. That is why I said that."
A pattern is discernible. Three controversial statements coming from a trio of Congress leaders, within a short span of time hardly qualifies as a convenient coincidence. Would it not be a fair assumption that perhaps these leaders were speaking the mind of their top leadership and projecting the current Congress stance that disregards the nation and its interests over trying to seem placatingly pleasant to another country?
Mr Salman Khurshid penned his defense -
"In Defense of My Speech in Pakistan". In it he writes "One Ms Lekhi of the BJP put me in the league of ISIS, mouth frothing with indignation! Surely, there is a difference between someone who rapes women of other faiths, takes sex slaves, enjoys slitting throats, threatens to destroy civilisation - and someone who happens to disagree with you...The Hafiz Saeed school on venality and violence, not to mention the perversity personified in ISIS, are the common enemy of humanity and would like nothing better than humanity beginning to fight amongst itself so that they continue with their destruction..."
While Mr Khurshid has eloquently and correctly categorised the ISIS, why hasn't he displayed the same zeal to denounce historian Irfan Habib's comparison of the RSS with ISIS? Or does he believe the RSS is an organisation which "rapes women of other faiths, takes sex slaves, enjoys slitting throats, threatens to destroy civilisation..." much like the ISIS?
Mr Khurshid cannot be expected to take a risk of such magnitude. Even to be seen as remotely defending the RSS would be nothing short of anathema for members of the Congress. It is this very flexible and convenient conviction that makes his own defense, and by that measure of the ideology he presents, appear a formality.
(Nalin S Kohli is spokesperson for the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and Director of the party's Public Policy Research Centre. He is also an advocate and has extensive experience in media and education.)Disclaimer: The opinions expressed within this article are the personal opinions of the author. The facts and opinions appearing in the article do not reflect the views of NDTV and NDTV does not assume any responsibility or liability for the same.