Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi at Parliament in New Delhi on Tuesday
Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi - whose support is said to be keeping Tarun Gogoi in the Assam chief minister's chair despite massive rebellion against him - today said tersely that the political crisis in the eastern state is an "internal issue" of the Congress.
He also said, "I have made my views clear internally." On Monday, a senior minister resigned from the Tarun Gogoi ministry and challenged the Congress leadership publicly, staging the denouement in a long-drawn-out protest against the Assam chief minister.
(Top Assam Minister Quits as Dissent against Congress Grows)Mr Gogoi, who is being blamed by rivals for the Congress' debacle in Assam in this year's general elections, will survive this assault too with the firm support of Mr Gandhi. But there is now reportedly a divide in the Congress over the latter's handling of rebels in the party across states.
The position of the 44-year-old Congress number 2 has so far been that the party will not yield to pressure or blackmail and that opposing camps must reconcile. Any change leadership, he reportedly insists, must be by consensus.
It has helped Mr Gogoi's cause that his chief detractor, Himanta Biswa Sarma is a controversial figure who was even jailed once as a student leader on charges of extortion.
In a party where the Gandhi word has been writ for the longest time and where the first family is zealously protected from political attack or criticism, questions are now being asked about Mr Gandhi's leadership failing to quell rebellion in Assam and also Maharashtra, a crucial state that goes to polls this year.
(Congress' Rebel Trouble in Two States)Mr Gandhi's style of functioning came under close scrutiny after the party's humiliating defeat in the general elections - it has been reduced to 44 seats in the Lok Sabha, a tally that does not even qualify it for a Leader of Opposition post.
Mr Gandhi is seen as the architect of the Congress' election game-plan. In a churn within the stunned party after its defeat, the tentative murmurs of Congressmen that Mr Gandhi must be less insulated and must interact more with workers and partymen have grown louder.