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After Jairam Ramesh, Mani Shankar Aiyar calls for introspection, says Congress ‘should look at reality’

YB WEB DESK. Dated: 8/10/2017 8:37:23 PM

After Congress leader Jairam Ramesh raised concerns over the party’s current fate, senior Congress leader and former union minister Mani Shankar Aiyar has also spoken out on the issue asking for introspection. “Congressmen should look at reality. We have only 44 MPs and have faced serious setbacks,” he told news agency ANI.
Ramesh had ruffled quite a few feathers in the party’s senior leaders circle by saying that the Congress was facing an “existential crisis.” He also questioned the way party members were dealing with the current political fate of the Congress. “I would say that the Congress is facing an existential crisis. It is not an electoral crisis. The party really is in deep crisis,” he told news agency PTI.
Former environment minister had also remarked that “the Sultanate has gone, but we behave as if we are sultans still.” Stressing on the need for new strategies, Ramesh had said the Congress needed to understand that they were against PM Narendra Modi and BJP President Amit Shah. “They think differently, they act differently, and if we are not flexible in our approach, we will become irrelevant, frankly,” he told PTI.
Without backing up Ramesh directly, Manish Shankar Aiyar on Thursday said the Congress needed to focus on his intention. “More important than the expression Jairam used, he said Congress needs new ideas new thoughts, new methods of working, new ways,” Aiyar was quoted as saying ANI.

Unlike Aiyar, some of the Congress leaders on Tuesday disagreed with Ramesh’s comments. “A few Congress leaders who came through the back doors, enjoyed the fruits of power and occupied high positions in the Congress governments feel that the Congress is facing an existential crisis as the party is out of power in the Centre and most states,” former Union minister K V Thomas told The Indian Express.
Congress MP M Veerappa Moily said Ramesh had “grossly crossed the limits of discipline in the party.” “We have toiled for this party for the last 50 years and we know what it is… the pain, pain of the leadership and pain of the workers… rank and file. And people who have not undergone the pain and agony… of working in the Congress and only enjoyed the pleasure of power, only they can make such statements,” he told