Kamal Nath quits as CLP leader. Will Congress enforce one man, one post for all?

Behind former chief minister and Madhya Pradesh Congress Committee (MPCC) chief Kamal Nath’s resignation as the Leader of the Opposition in the Madhya Pradesh assembly, lies an incident that happened last month.

The assembly was in session and when Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chauhan got up to speak, he is reported to have remarked, “I’m raising this issue but the LoP is not here to listen to me.” As expected, the incident made headlines and when reporters quizzed Nath, he said- “Should I listen to him or should I be listening to the people of the state and workers?”

New Delhi: Behind former chief minister and Madhya Pradesh Congress Committee (MPCC) chief Kamal Nath’s resignation as the Leader of the Opposition in the Madhya Pradesh assembly, lies an incident that happened last month. The assembly was in session and when Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chauhan got up to speak, he is reported to have remarked, “I’m raising this issue but the LoP is not here to listen to me.” As expected, the incident made headlines and when reporters quizzed Nath, he said- “Should I listen to him or should I be listening to the people of the state and workers?”

And so, two years after Nath lost the majority of seats in the Madhya Pradesh assembly and had to resign as chief minister, he’s now given up his dual posts and will just stick to being PCC chief. Speaking to HT, he said, “Elections are just 18 months away so I have work to do.”

He is believed to have written a letter to Congress president Sonia Gandhi two months ago asking for the same. Today, party general secretary KC Venugopal issued a letter which said that his resignation from the post had been accepted and seven-time MLA Govind Singh had been appointed as the new CLP leader. The 70-year-old veteran politician, who was a minister when Kamal Nath was chief minister, was the deputy leader of the opposition in the assembly.

Another former minister said many other changes are expected in the state soon.

But it is not clear if the one-man-one-post principle will be enforced for other Congress leaders as well. The most prominent of those who are exceptions to this rule are Member of Parliament Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury who not only is the leader of opposition in Lok Sabha but also heads the party’s West Bengal unit. There is also party general secretary Randeep Surjewala, who is in-charge of Karnataka, and the party’s in-charge of the media department.

Kamal Nath has been playing a lead role in Madhya Pradesh ever since the Congress won the state in 2018. There have been occasional reports that the Congress could give him a “larger role” at the national level. For instance, when the Group of 23 asked for wide-ranging reforms in 2020 and elections in every post, Nath became one person who spoke to both the Gandhis and the change seekers.