The Old Fox

On Thursday night, Sitaram Kesri established his hold over the 112-year-old Congress party with an emphatic 82.36 per cent win.

Kesri, who had been a backroom operator in the Congress for years, including a 17-year stint as party treasurer, emerged the provisional head of the party last September after a much- maligned P V Narasimha Rao was forced to quit.

Since then Kesri (or Chacha, as he is known in party circles), who has projected himself as a messiah of the minorities and downtrodden, has left no stone unturned to strengthen his position in the nation's oldest political party.

He lost no time in appointing his own men to important party posts and got Narasimha Rao to resign as Congress Parliamentary Party leader late last year. When faced with the likelihood of a prolonged investigation, Chacha took the gamble and withdrew his party's support to the H D Deve Gowda-led United Front government on March 30.

Though the move earned him a lot of criticism within the Congress, he got everything the way he wanted -- 'anti-Congress' leader Deve Gowda was out and 'friendly' I K Gujral was in.

And to cap it all off, he has now retained the party presidency without much ado!

Born in a bania family in 1919 in Bihar's Danapur region, Kesri was just 12 when he was imprisoned as an accused in the Ranchi conspiracy case in 1931 -- another bout in prison followed two years later. Kesri was jailed again in 1937, 1940 and 1942 for participating in the Independence movement.

It was during his imprisonment that he came in contact with Jayaprakash Narayan and became instrumental in the latter's escape from jail in 1942. He, however, parted ways with the socialist leader when JP challenged Jawaharlal Nehru after Independence.

In 1958, he became the Patna District Congress Committee secretary and then onwards, maneuvered his way through the treacherous caste politics of Bihar.

Kesri appeared on the national political scene in 1967 when he was elected to the Lok Sabha. Four years later he was elected to the Rajya Sabha from Bihar. He was appointed the state Congress president from 1973 to 1977.

In 1979, he was appointed treasurer of the Congress party, a post which he held till September last year. With the exception of a three-year stint (from 1967 to 1970) as a Lok Sabha member, Kesri has always entered Parliament as a member of the Rajya Sabha.

Kesri remained loyal to Indira Gandhi during and after the Emergency travails of the Congress and the subsequent Janata Party regime. It was perhaps due to his loyalty and contacts with the business houses that Indira Gandhi appointed him party treasurer.

In November 1980, he became minister of state for parliamentary affairs in the Indira Gandhi ministry. In 1985, he got the same portfolio in her son's council of ministers. He took a back seat in the early years of the Rajiv era. But once Rajiv's reformist zeal wore off, Kesri was back in the reckoning.

In the Congress's bruising battles with Rashtrapati Bhavan during Giani Zail Singh's tenure, it was often Kesri who came to Rajiv's rescue.

Kesri has now surpassed himself.

For, finally, it is the old man who is having the last laugh -- not the Pawars or the Pilots!