K'taka: Jaffer Sharief withdraws resignation

Senior Congress leader and former Union minister C K Jaffer Sharief has withdrawn his resignation from the party after a meeting with party president Sonia Gandhi on Sunday.

Coverage: Karnataka Votes

Following his marathon meeting with Sonia, Sharief -- who had resigned from the party on Friday -- said he was satisfied with the outcome and asserted that all his problems had been redressed. He, however, refused to divulge details of the package offered to him by the Congress chief.

Sharief had aired various grievances before the Congress high command -- the main being the denial of a ticket to his grandson, Abdul Rehman Sharief, to contest the forthcoming Karnataka assembly elections.

Sharief had said that he was not being utilised properly by the party. He also said that proper representation was not being given to minorities in the Congress while distributing tickets.

Sources in the Congress said he was trying to block the entry of former Janata Dal-Secular leader CM Ibrahim into the party. During the 2004 parliamentary elections, Sharief had lost to BJP candidate H T Sangliana from the Bangalore North constituency.

Ibrahim, who was the candidate from JD-S then, had split the Muslim votes, thus paving the way for Sharief's defeat. Sharief fears that Ibrahim's entry may thwart his chances at having a shot at the parliamentary seat in the next polls.

Even as the Congress managed to diffuse the Sharief crisis on Sunday, the party received another jolt. Gurupadappa Nagmarpalli, senior party leader from Karnataka, resigned from the party after he was denied a ticket from Bidar.