Sonia Gandhi Inches Closer To Top Post, Elected CPP Leader

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The Congress president herself was late in reaching the venue, and was not present when her name was proposed, seconded and approved.

The decision was announced by Manmohan Singh barely a couple of minutes after Mukherjee made the proposal.

Soon after Gandhi herself reached the venue amid loud cheers of 'Sonia Gandhi zindabad' (long live Sonia Gandhi) from the crowds assembled outside as well as the newly elected MPs.

Among the Congress MPs at the meeting was the lone representative from Chhattisgarh, Ajit Jogi, who arrived in a wheelchair from hospital.

After her election. Sonia Gandhi said the country has decisively rejected the divisive ideology of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), the Bharatiya Janata Party and their allied organisations.

Sonia Gandhi said the people have rejected the hate-filled campaigns of the RSS, the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) and other organisations, as also the politics of arrogance and personal attacks.

In her acceptance speech, Gandhi thanked the MPs for reposing faith in her. "The people of India have chosen us to represent their aspirations, not ours," she said.

She specially welcomed the party's young first-time MPs and also spared a thought for those "who fought hard, but could not make it." They should not lose heart, she said.

Sonia Gandhi congratulated all her party colleagues for putting up a great fight against all odds and bringing the party back to power.

She reminded her MPs that they must never forget that it is the people's mandate to work for them, for the poorer sections of society.

Sonia Gandhi, the widow of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi, is the latest torchbearer of the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty. The dynasty has dominated the Congress party which has ruled India for 44 of the years since becoming an independent nation in 1947.

After distancing herself from politics after her husband's assassination in 1991, Sonia was initially seen as a reluctant and almost reclusive politician. She officially took charge of the Congress party in 1998 and was elected to parliament in the last elections in 1999.

Before the surprise results in the current general election, Sonia Gandhi's future in Indian politics had looked somewhat uncertain. Under her leadership, the party had turned in its worst performance since independence in the 1999 general elections. Congress also performed indifferently in last year's state elections.

However, Sonia Gandhi’s name is still revered in India and Congress looked to her to translate that feeling into votes.

Her political opponents attempted to rake up her Italian descent as an election issue saying the choice for voters was between an Indian or foreign leader.

But their appeal to xenophobia apparently fell on deaf ears.Media analyst Bhaskar Rao said: "The foreign origin [of Sonia Gandhi] was not an issue."

Long before the election she surrendered her Italian passport in favour of full Indian citizenship. Sonia Gandhi herself said in a television interview: "I never felt they look at me as a foreigner. Because I'm not. I am Indian."

Her campaign this year was boosted by the entry of her son, Rahul, as a candidate. Her daughter Priyanka has also campaigned energetically for her.

Rahul Gandhi was elected by a huge margin in the Amethi constituency

Sonia Maino was born on 9 December 1946 in the town of Orbassano, near Turin, to a building contractor and his wife. She was raised in a traditional Roman Catholic household – her mother and two sisters still live in Orbassano - but in 1964 she went to Cambridge University to study English.

Her life changed forever when she met her future husband, Rajiv Gandhi, who was studying engineering at Cambridge. The couple married in 1968 and she moved into the house of her mother-in-law and then Prime Minister, Indira Gandhi.

She initially disliked Indian food and clothes and caused controversy when she was photographed wearing a miniskirt. However, she spent the 1970s becoming steeped in Indian culture. Although she has learned Hindi, she is not a fluent speaker of the language. She no doubt also watched and learned as Indira fought a variety of political battles.

In 1984 Indira Gandhi was assassinated by her Sikh bodyguards in retaliation for her decision to send troops into their holiest shrine, the Golden Temple in Punjab.

Sonia was propelled into the forefront of the Indian political scene as Rajiv, whose brother Sanjay died in a plane crash in 1980, was picked as the successor to the Gandhi-Nehru crown.

Rajiv became prime minister but seven years later tragedy struck the Gandhi family again.

Priyanka presented Sonia with a grandchild in August 2000 Sonia's husband was killed by a Tamil suicide bomber during a visit to Madras in 1991.

She and her children, Rahul and Priyanka, were consumed with grief. Sonia resisted Congress attempts to persuade her to step into Rajiv's shoes and eschewed politics for several years.

Eventually, in 1998, she agreed to become more involved but her initial efforts were overshadowed by Congress's humiliating defeat by the BJP in the 1999 election.

In August 2000 she became a grandmother for the first time when Priyanka gave birth to a son.

Earlier that year she asked a court to grant clemency to a woman who had played a part in the bomb attack which killed her husband.

The bomber, Nalini, had appealed for mercy on the grounds that her seven-year-old daughter would be orphaned if she was hanged. The court later commuted Nalini's death sentence.

Sonia is a familiar figure in Amethi, her husband's rural parliamentary constituency in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh which her son Rahul now represents. She herself represents the neighbouring seat of Rai Bareilly.

SHOCK WIN: It is worth mentioning here that the Congress won a shock victory in the general election and is returning to power after eight years in opposition.

Congress leaders have been holding talks with possible partners to form a coalition government.

However, Sonia Gandhi herself has not said if she wants to be the fourth member of the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty to hold the post. "There being no other proposal, I declare Sonia Gandhi unanimously elected as leader of the Congress Parliamentary Party," said senior Congress leader Manmohan Singh, as newly elected Congress MPs banged their tables.

But its clear that it is shown that in the past traditionally the leader of the party in parliament has often also become Prime Minister. It may, however, be several days before the new holder of that post is confirmed.

Now Sonia Gandhi will meet leftist political allies over the weekend to discuss bringing them into a coalition government, after Congress fell short of a securing clear majority in parliament.

The widow of assassinated former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi is then expected to seek approval from President APJ Abdul Kalam to form a new government.

In her first post-election interview on Friday, Sonia Gandhi said she was not "attached to any particular position". "As far as the issue of prime minister, it will be the victorious members of parliament... who will elect the leader."

Sonia Gandhi also said she was pleased that her Italian heritage - which could make her the first foreign-born Indian Prime Minister - had not harmed Congress in the polls.

"Most of the Congress Party's opponents used this against me, but I had full faith in the judgement of the people of my country," said Sonia Gandhi, who took Indian citizenship in 1983.

Negotiations with possible coalition partners on Friday are said to have produced the basis for an agreement - but stock markets fell on concerns of a possible role for communists in the new coalition cabinet.

The fall reflected business concerns that the new coalition could be detrimental to India's privatisation programme.

Harkishan Singh Surjeet of the Communist Party of India-Marxist – a key Congress ally - said the selling off of profit-making state-owned companies must stop.

However, Sonia Gandhi sought to reassure investors, saying that India's economic reforms had been initiated by her husband and other Congress leaders and "naturally" would continue.

Congress, which led India to independence and then ran the country for most of the next 40 years, won the most seats in the 545-member parliament, but fell short of a majority.

Re-polling has been ordered in three seats in the eastern state of Bihar because of irregularities and in one seat in Manipur because of a landslip. Two seats are appointed by the president.

Outgoing Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee has been asked to continue until a new prime minister is sworn in.