NEW DELHI, NOV 3: With barely a week to go for elections to the Congress president's post, the ``Save Sonia'' campaign began in right earnest today with AICC general secretary and hardcore loyalist Ambika Soni quitting her party post to canvass for her boss. Congress general secretary Ghulam Nabi Azad will now head the party's media cell in her place. Meanwhile, Sonia's challenger Jitendra Pradada, back from a rather uninspiring trip to Chennai, accused the rival camp of forcing party workers and PCC delegates to stay away from him. He, however, declined to take on Sonia's charge that he was part of Rajiv Gandhi's coterie.``If she believes that Rajiv had a coterie than I have nothing more to say,'' he said.His visit to Sriperumbudur to pay homage to Rajiv Gandhi was, however, aimed at sending a strong signal to party cadres that his fight was not against the Gandhi family. His statement today that he was contesting to ``save the legacy of the great family'' was intended to convey the message that Sonia was not the true inheritor of the legacy. Soni's abrupt resignation from the AICC caught party circles off-guard since Sonia had herself responded sharply to Prasada's charges and asserted that she was not scared of a contest. While tendering her resignation, Soni, who is also a CWC member, said that she wanted to uphold the highest traditions of the party and not campaign for Sonia while holding a post. Soni also said that she would respond to the charges being levelled by the Prasada camp in the coming days.This kind of ``command performance'' in favour of Sonia is not new in the party. After the poor showing in last year's Lok Sabha elections, as many as six of the seven general secretaries had tendered their resignations, admitting moral responsibility for the debacle.There was speculation today that Soni's resignation would be followed by that of other AICC office-bearers, in a unanimous show of solidarity for their leader. Obviously, those resigning are angling for a place in Sonia's reconstituted AICC after the elections.The reason behind fielding Soni, say party sources, is to ensure that the charges made by the Prasada camp don't go unresponded. Sonia loyalists feel that silence from the high command could send a wrong signal to the cadres. Soni is said to be one of Sonia's most trusted aides and she had recently been drafted to head the party's media cell to better articulate the party's position on issues of public importance. While her entry into the election scene on Sonia's behalf is bound to raise the pitch of the coming contest, Prasada supporters are sure to cite it as another sign of panic on the part of their rivals.Meanwhile, an undeterred Prasada plans to go ahead with his visits to other state capitals such as Jaipur, Patna and Calcutta despite being virtually ignored by the Tamil Nadu PCC. The so-called dissidents in the state unit, K Thankgabalu and T Ramamurthy, were summoned to Delhi when Prasada was in Chennai and journalists outnumbered party workers wherever he went.
