Thursday, 09 February 2023 | PNS | DEHRADUN
In an interesting political development former chief minister Harish Rawat met former Pradesh Congress Committee (PCC) president Pritam Singh at the residence of later here on Wednesday. The meeting between the two leaders lasted for an hour. After the meeting both the leaders said that they held talks to make the party strong in the State and discussed the upcoming Lok Sabha elections.
Rawat said that Pritam Singh is a senior leader of the party and nothing should be inferred from a simple meeting between the two. Pritam Singh also said that Rawat is a very senior leader and one gets guidance from him. Even as the two tallest leaders of the Uttarakhand tried to downplay the meeting, it fuelled political speculations on the changing dimensions of power in Uttarakhand Congress. It is clear that the state unit of the party is divided into factions and both Rawat and Pritam Singh head different camps. Recently Pritam Singh targeted Rawat for his comment on promoting young leaders in the party and said that the situation of the Congress party would have been different had the young leaders been given a chance earlier. In the run-up for the last year’s assembly elections Singh stonewalled attempts by Rawat to project himself as the chief ministerial face of the party. The camp followers of Pritam Singh also blame Rawat for removal of their leader from the key position of PCC president just before the assembly elections. After the assembly elections, Harish Rawat is said to have backed the candidature of Yashpal Arya for the position of Leader of Opposition (LoP) in the assembly, a position Singh was eyeing.
However the meeting between the two stalwarts of the party on Wednesday is being viewed as an attempt to patch up the differences between the two leaders.
It is pertinent to mention here that the top leadership of the party including Harish Rawat and Pritam Singh was present in Jammu and Kashmir recently in the Bharat Jodo Yatra of Rahul Gandhi. The meeting between the two leaders on Wednesday is being viewed as an extension of the party high command generated bonhomie.
