CK Jaffer Sharief – A Resigned Man

Mr. C.K. Jaffer Sharief has been Member of Parliament for a long time. He has been part of every Lok Sabha from 5th to 13th Lok Sabha except 11th. This means that he has been in the apex body of Indian legislation from 1971 to 2004. He wasn’t part of 11th Lok Sabha so you can take two years out of that and you have an experience of 31 years as an MP.

But CK’s long association with the Congress goes even before Independence. He was part of Quit India movement when he was very young. It means that he has been part of the Congress for more than 60 years and 30 of those years as a Congress MP. So what will it take for an old Congress man like him to resign from the Congress?

Counting from 1971 when he first got elected to Lok Sabha, there have lot of events that happened in nation’s history that could have prompted him to be disgusted by the Congress and its policies and resigned in protest. We have some of the darkest incidents happened during Congress rule e.g. emergency, some of the worst riots against Muslims, the movement to destroy Babri Masjid, terrorism spread in many parts of India. Lot of scandals including Bofors and horse-trading of MPs. But none of these affected CK in fact he defended the government when in Parliament after Babri Masjid was destroyed. He continued in his position as the Railways minister.

So, if these big issues can not move him what made him to think about resigning from Congress now? He was apparently angry that his grand son was not put by his party for the assembly election of Karnataka.

It is a different matter that his son-in-law was already given a ticket. Read the story below from Pioneer. With leaders like these, who needs BJP?

Satisfied with Sonia’s assurance, Sharief withdraws resignation

Daily Pioneer

Pioneer News Service | New Delhi

Monday, April 28, 2008

Congress president Sonia Gandhi on Sunday managed to pacify former Railway Minister C K Jaffer Sharief, who had resigned from the party after his grandson was denied a ticket, with an “assurance”, and the six-time MP from Karnataka withdrew his resignation.

Sharief’s resignation had sent shock waves in the party ahead of the crucial Karnataka Assembly elections next month. The resignation came from Sharief, who is the head of Congress’ manifesto committee in Karnataka, two days before the party had to release its election manifesto. After losing successive Assembly elections in States, the Congress wants to keep its pack together in Karnataka. Sensing trouble before the polls, Sonia summoned Sharief on Sunday. He met the party president. Though Sharief was accompanied by his grandson Rehman, only general secretary in-charge of Karnataka Prithviraj Chavan was present during the meeting. Rehman said he waited outside.

After a brief meeting with Sonia, Sharief climbed down from his earlier stance and said that he was “satisfied”. Emerging from the party president’s 10 Janpath residence, Sharief said: “I am in full agreement with the Congress president’s view that the country would be going for elections in a year’s time and so our first priority is to defeat communal forces. Karnataka will be the first State to do so.” He said he was satisfied with “the assurance” given by the party president. “I agree with Soniaji that secularism and unity of the Congress is paramount in this election.” When asked if he had withdrawn his resignation, Sharief said: “You mean I need to say that? It is automatically withdrawn.”

Sharief’s grandson, Rehman, had sought a Congress ticket from Shivajinagar and had given a choice of two other constituencies. Almost rubbing it in, the party decided to field Roshan Baig, Sharief’s rival for minority votes in Bangalore North from Shivajinagar constituency. The party said Baig was chosen over Sharief’s grandson Rehman on the criterion of the ability to win and also because Sharief’s son-in-law Syed Yasin had already been given a ticket to contest from Raichur. Following this, Sharief resigned pushing Congress in a corner. Though he maintained that it wasn’t because of denial of ticket to his son, leaders knew what had caused the anger. [Daily Pioneer]