Missing face

The Congress had planned to showcase the “most visible faces of reforms” of the UPA Government to counter Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi’s influence in urban areas and to woo middle-class voters and beneficiaries of economic reforms. While Prime Minister Manmohan Singh addressed public meetings, as scheduled, and Finance Minister P Chidambaram addressed a press conference in Ahmedabad on the last day of the campaign on Friday, the party missed the absence of the third face, Commerce Minister Kamal Nath who was AICC General Secretary in charge of Gujarat during the 2002 assembly election. “He had many engagements abroad,” explained a senior Congress leader.