HOW did Deepender Singh Hooda, 42 and senior advocate KTS Tulsi, 72, newly elected Members of Rajya Sabha from Haryana and Chhattisgarh get the ticket from the Congress leadership? Let us talk about Deepender’s ticket first. The Congress could have allotted the ticket to Randeep Singh Surjewala. party spokesperson, or Shailja Kumari, President of Haryana Congress Party. Clearly, there are wheels within wheels here. Surjewala is a confidant of Rahul Gandhi. Shailja Kumari is a daughter of a veteran Dalbir Singh, a dalit Congress Leader from Sirsa and close sounding board of Congress President Sonia Gandhi.
The criteria should have been to choose among the best party leaders who can boost the morale of the workers but no, it is not so easy. In the Congress, family priorities and utility are paramount. The dictum is, if the family is saved, the rest can be taken care off. Deepender’s father Bhupinder Singh Hooda had served as Chief Minister of Haryana for nine years and reportedly obliged Priyanka’s husband Robert Vadra. The Central Bureau of Investigation and the Enforcement Directorate have filed many cases in the courts and are investigating Bhupinder Hooda’s reported benevolence towards Vadra. Rahul, Priyanka, Robert and Sonia Gandhi need Bhupinder more than Hooda needs them and so Deepender got the ticket. Now, let’s talk about veteran advocate KTS Tulsi, who was nominated to the Rajya Sabha in April 2014 by the then President of India and Bharat Ratna Pranab Mukherjee. Tulsi hails from Hoshiarpur, Punjab, and is a very humble, soft spoken human being. He owns a Mercedes Benz and Buick90L limousine but still prefers to go to Parliament by bicycle at times as he lives at Motilal Nehru Marg. He is representing Robert Vadra in the Vadra-DLF land case and money laundering case. He has personally travelled to many high courts to defend Vadra. How could the Congress afford to jettison Tulsi? Bhupinder Hooda has clearly learnt a lot from former Chief Minister Bansi Lal and soft-spoken Tulsi has learnt a lot from Dr. Manmohan Singh on how to remain effective and vibrant in the Congress Party.
