Gandhi Widow To Head India Party

In an effort to rebuild its government, India's Congress party on Saturday picked the Italian-born widow of assassinated prime minister Rajiv Gandhi as its new president.

Though Sonia Gandhi has next-to-no political experience and has not outlined any particular vision for the country, she is associated with the family that ruled India for 35 of its 50 years of independence, and is thus immensely popular.

Party insiders have been pushing for her appointment as Congress president ever since her husband's 1991 assassination. Only recently has she ended her reclusiveness and agreed to enter politics.

Although her appointment comes in the aftermath of elections that have left the major parties scrambling for a parliamentary majority, it is not expected to change Congress' current standing. The Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party won the most seats in the elections and is likely to get the opportunity to form India's first stable government in several years.

The man Gandhi is to replace, Sitaram Kesri, criticized her appointment, calling it illegal because the vote was conducted in his absence. He refused to step down, but appears powerless to block the shuffle.

While Kesri made no major tactical errors during his tenure, the party has slumped under his auspices, and the time was seen as right to nudge him aside.

"I will try my best to live up to the expectations of the party," party officials quoted her as saying during a closed-door meeting of the Working Committee Saturday evening.

Gandhi's election is expected to be ratified by the party's supreme body, the 8,000-member All India Congress Committee, on April 4.

Earlier Saturday, the Bharatiya Janata Party's bid to form the government was revived when a powerful regional politician grudgingly announced her support.

BJP president L.K. Advani said that with the commitment from J. Jayalalitha's All-India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagan, he expected India's president would soon call on them to form a government.

But late Saturday, BJP spokesman Pramod Mahajan said the party was seven pledges short and was waiting for crucial letters of support from allies in southern India.

The national election left the three main players—BJP, Congress and the United Front—casting for enough support among smaller and independent parties for a majority in the 545-member lower house of parliament. President K.R. Narayanan must decide which group is in the best position to provide the stable government that has eluded India for the past two years.

This year's election mirrored the last vote, in 1996, which also resulted in a deadlocked parliament. Politicians tried for two years to form a stable coalition or minority government, and when they failed, a new ballot was called three years ahead of schedule.

Congress brought down a United Front government in November, accusing one of its members of backing a rebel group lined to the 1991 assassination Gandhi, Congress's leader in addition to being prime minister.

Written by Hema Shukla.
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