The Presidentship of the Andhra Provincial Congress
Committee, which Mr. Prakasam has held for so many years, is at last becoming
vacant, on his having become Premier. Not all Presidents of provincial Congress
organizations can be said to be real leaders of the people, genuinely
representing them in the areas of their respective jurisdictions. One test of
genuine representative status is that control of the organization should not be
necessary for continuance of political importance; as is the case, for example,
with leaders like Gandhi and Nehru who confer on the Congress organization as
much of prestige as they receive from it, and do not therefore decline in
importance when they happens to relinquish a key position in the organization such
as the Presidentship of the Congress or of any of the Provincial Committees.
* * *
There are, on the other hand,
leaders who derive from the organization which they come to control, far more
of influence than they are able to impart to it as a result of their personal
association with it. A classic example is the present President of the Tamil Nadu
Congress Committee, Mr. Kamaraj Nadar. With or without a position in the
Congress organization, Mr. C. Rajagopalachari is a man to reckon with. A
quarter century of unremitting toil in public causes in the course of which
high character, great ability and many virtues found prominent expression, have
invested him with a power and force capable of withstanding all hostile
onslaughts designed to supplant him from public life. In a similar situation Kamaraj
Nadar would have been reduced to complete nullity.
* * *
His rise in importance was very
steep when he became President of the Tamil Nadu P.C.C. Equally steep is likely
to be his fall to inconsequence should he cease to hold that office. Knowledge
of this fact seems to have imposed on Kamaraj a grasping tendency. According to
reports received, freedom of election would appear to have become a thing of
the past in the Tamil Nadu Congress. Complaints have come from many quarters
that forms for enrolment of Congress members were denied to pro-C.R.
applicants. In the P.C.C. elections all sorts of malpractices are reported to
have been openly encouraged. They were all evidently conceived to hound out of
the Congress organization anyone suspected of being unfriendly to the ruling
President. To what limits this passion of exclusion can be carried is
illustrated in the formal announcement of the success of some other candidate,
ignoring Mrs. Subbarayan who secured the largest number of votes. Apparently
Kamaraj is frightened of ceasing to be President. Every trick and flimsy
pretext is therefore pressed into service for the elimination of his potential
opponents from the P.C.C.
* * *
Kamaaraj stepped into his present
position in consequence of the avoidance of a direct flight for the
Presidentship by stalwarts like C.R. and Satyamurthi. When a second-rater gets
into first-rate rank, decline in the morals of public life and of the political
activity subject to his guidance, is inevitable. Tamil Nadu should be an
example to other Congress provinces against the folly of permitting second-rate
leadership to occupy positions of supreme influence in the Congress organization.
In the Andhra P.C.C. Mr. Prakasam as President is a difficult man to succeed.
There is no taller Congressman in Andhra Desa—none has given so much, worked so
hard and unceasingly, and until his recent rise to Premiership, received so
little in return. To the position to be presently vacated by him, Mr. Pallam
Raju is one of the aspirants. Mr. Pallam Raju is a man of considerable energy.
Given the proper direction, he is a good executive instrument for giving it
practical application. He lacks self-dependent discretion. For years his
activities were guided by Mr. Bulusu Sambamurthi, and because he was an ideal
lieutenant, he built for himself a large reputation for political reliability
in his own district, most of which he lost swiftly when he had to fall back on
his own resources of judgment. Recently, with prodigious activity he won the
role of a champion wobbler. Andhra Congress affairs need this guidance of a
steadier intellect.
* * *
Dr. Pattabhi, as is the way with him, may be expected to
announce himself at the eleventh hour, but Dr. Pattabhi is unsuited to P.C.
Presidentship at the moment. The successor of Mr. Prakasam should be a
democrat. Professor Ranga has a wider following than Dr. Pattabhi, but like the
doctor, he is consumed by hatred of the Communists. Hatred is an evil passion which
will not allow anyone possessed by it to do any good, and in the difficult
period ahead, the great need is for men gifted with the power of bringing together
elements divided in politics into harmonious common work for the maximum of
public and social good. My vote would be for Mr. Sambamurthi. It is alleged
against him that he has been moving too much in the company of maharajas and
zamindars. Any company can be kept by one with detachment enough not to be
sullied by what is objectionable in it, and Bulusu undoubtedly has detachment
enough to remain himself in all companies. He gave proof of great ability as
Speaker. He is a man of the people. He is capable of moving with the times. Of
all aspirants to the P.C.C. Presidentship, he is most worthy to succeed Mr.
Prakasam.—(May 18, 1946) S A K A.
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