From Jal Khambata

NEW DELHI: Congress President Sonia Gandhi is under pressure
from her coterie to dump errant West Bengal PCC Chief A B Ghani
Khan Chaudhary and company for espousing "Mahajot" of all
non-left parties in the state and better tie up with the ruling
CPI(M) to defeat the BJP's evil designs to capture the state.

Even while trying to save whatever Congress is left in the state
by soft-pedalling all provocative statements of Ghani Khan
Chaudhary, Sonia Gandhi on Tuesday nominated a 3-member team of
observers--Vayalar Ravi, R K Dhawan and Kamal Nath--to rush to
Calcutta to probe the cross-voting in the Rajya Sabha elections.

The team has been asked to submit a detailed report to the
Congress President within two weeks, incharge AICC General
Secretary Prabha Rau announced.

Meanwhile, after a lot of persuation, Ghani Khan Chaudhary has
agreed to reach Delhi on Thursday for a meeting with Sonia
Gandhi, though he has made it quite clear in Calcutta that he
would leave the Congress than giving up his idea of Mahajot.

He has been stressing time and again that there was no question
of any truck with the BJP as he was only contemplating the
Congress to join hands with Trinamul Congress of Mamta
Bannerjee, who had split the Congress only because its then
leadership had been befriending the ruling Communists.

Sonia Gandhi was initially favourable to the Mahajot idea since
it can help rope back Mamta into the Congress fold, but the
party has chickened off since after the mischievous call of Home
Minister Lal Krishna Advani to the Congress to join hands in
West Bengal under the umbrela of Mahajot to defeat the left
front ruling the state for over 15 years.

In an interesting development, Shiv Sena supremo Bal Thackeray
has sought an explanation from the BJP for Advani's open
invitation to the Congress. The Shiv Sena being an ally of the
National Democratic Alliance, it must know if the flirting with
the Congress would have any bearing on the NDA or it was limited
to achieve a territorial objective, Thackeray asked. END.
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