CALCUTTA, July 28: With no let up in sight in the factional war within the Pradesh Congress, the 80th plenary session appears to be moving towards a phase of uncertainty.The never ending bickering between Mamata Banerjee and Soumen Mitra, the Pradesh Congress Committee (PCC) chief, has marginalised the importance of the three-day plenary session beginning here from August 8.Mitra is trying hard to make the occasion a grand success without Mamta, who is all set to hold a parallel rally on August 9, adding to the chaos. The cabals at war have thrown up a formidable challenge before the grand event which will be the party's last plenary of this century.The All India Congress Committee (AICC) is in a tight spot with no signs of the crisis abating, more so because the PCC somewhat mindlessly isolated `the most powerful crowd-puller of the party', Mamata Banerjee.Mamata, who ``is out to get her pound of flesh now,'' could create a crisis-like situation for both the AICC and PCC during the grand event, admit several front ranking leaders of the West Bengal PCC, though there is no open report of dissension among them on the issue.What has particularly worried the PCC is the fact that the last minute patch-up bid by the AICC failed miserably. The patch-up attempt only harmed the prestige of the PCC which has been trying hard to prove that they were very much a united body, and wanted the high command to leave Mamata alone and let her `dissipate away.'Instead when Santosh Mohan Dev came as the first emissary of the high command, he publicly said, ``There is some truth in her (Mamta's) allegations.'' A piqued Soumen camp expressed their disapproval in no uncertain terms. Efforts by the other central leaders', including Jitendra Prasada, to negotiate peace with Mamata made the Soumen Camp even more unhappy.But they were satisfied when the All India Youth Congress president Satyajit Singh Gaekward, who also came to supervise the preparation, openly attacked Mamata saying that ``her action was misguided.'' Incidentally, Gaekward happened to be the only central leader, among those top leaders who visited the city recently, to have openly denounced Mamata for her role.If Gaekward's denouncement made the Soumen Camp happy, it did hurt the chances of peace as it only hardened Mamta's stance. It could not dissuade Mamata from holding a huge rally on the 21st of this month during which she uttered her `terrible comments' on both the PCC and AICC big guns.However, at one stage the Soumen camp had pinned all their hopes on the visiting Congress VIPs, who they thought might be able to dissuade Mamata.``Of course, nobody expected a miracle out of the last minute efforts, but we should have been a little more wise in tackling the situation,'' admitted a close confifante of Soumen.
