 "Sam Pitroda was reappointed as the Chairperson of the Indian Overseas Congress on Wednesday. PTI")
The troublemaker is back.
As per a press release issued by Congress General Secretary (Organisation) KC Venugopal, Sam Pitroda was reappointed as the Chairperson of the Indian Overseas Congress on Wednesday.
The 82-year-old resigned from his position one month ago due to comments he made that caused a political storm in the run-up to the Lok Sabha elections.
The reappointment
The letter said, “Honourable Congress President has reappointed Sam Pitroda as Chairman of the Indian Overseas Congress with immediate effect.”
The party’s Communications chief Jairam Ramesh said, “During the recent election campaign, Sam Pitroda had made some statements and comments that were totally unacceptable to the Indian National Congress.”
“By mutual consent, he stepped down as Chairman of Overseas Indian Congress. Subsequently, he clarified the context in which statements were made and how they were later distorted by the Modi campaign. The Congress President has reappointed him on the assurance that he will not in future leave room for such controversies to arise,” he said on X.
Impact Shorts
View AllThe resignation
In light of the controversy that followed his racist statement, Pitroda stated a few days before the Lok Sabha elections that he would be stepping down as the Indian Overseas Congress Chairperson.
“We have survived 70-75 years, in a very happy environment where people could live together, leaving aside a few fights here and there. We could hold together a country as diverse as India – where people on the East look like Chinese, people on the West look like Arabs, people the North look like maybe Whites and people in South India look like Africans. It doesn’t matter. We are all brothers and sisters,” the close confidant of the Nehru-Gandhi family had said.
Reacting to his remarks, Prime Minister Narendra Modi slammed Congress’s “divisive” mindset and said that the party wants to break the nation into pieces.
“Congress has, time and again, proved that it is against India, and against people of India,” he said.
He said in Telangana, “Today the Shehzada’s (a reference to Rahul Gandhi) philosopher has hurled sucha big abuse, which has filled me with anger. Can people’s ability be decided on the basis of skin colour?”
After the resignation, the Indian Premier had said in an interview that the Congress would bring back their “US-based” guru after a few days.
From inheritance tax to Ram mandir: How Sam Pitroda keeps scoring own goals for the Congress
His past controversies
Well, this wasn’t the first time the Congress’s go-to man in technological matters had put the party in a bind.
In April this year, Pitroda advocated for inheritance law in an interview with ANI.
A state tax on the assets a person inherits as part of an inheritance is known as an inheritance tax, as per Mint. The US does not have a central inheritance tax and only a few states have inheritance taxes as high as 20 per cent, according to Indian Express.
Advocating for the inheritance law, Pitroda cited the example of the US by saying, “Nothing wrong in accumulating wealth but to what point? Let me tell you, in America there’s an inheritance tax. So, if let’s say one has $100 million worth of wealth, and when he dies he can transfer probably 45 per cent t his children, 55 per cent is grabbed by government. Now that’s an interesting law.”
“It says you in your generation made wealth and you are leaving now, you must leave your wealth for the public… not all of it, half of it, which to me sounds fair,” he said, adding, “In India you don’t have that. If somebody is worth $10 billion and dies his children get $10 billion. The public gets nothing. So these are the kinds of issues that people will have to debate and discuss,” he said as per The Times of India.
His comments came at a time when PM Modi was accusing the Congress of wanting to redistribute the nation’s wealth, putting the party on the defensive over the subject.
Congress’ general secretary (communications) and senior leader Jairam Ramesh clarified that Pitroda’s views did not reflect the views of the party.
“Sam Pitroda express his views on issues that he considers important, very freely. On this particular issue also he is not reflecting the official position of the Congress. But I think what is happening is, that his comments are torn out of context and they are being sensationalised in order to divert attention from the PM’s deliberate, mischievous and malicious, poison-ridden campaign.”
Pitroda clarified on Wednesday that his remarks regarding the US inheritance tax law were misrepresented to “deflect attention” away from the important points.
In May 2019, Pitroda caused a stir when he responded, “so what,” to a query about the alleged role of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi in the 1984 anti-Sikh riots .
In response to the BJP’s claim that “instruction” during the 1984 anti-Sikh riots came from Rajiv Gandhi’s office, according to Mint, Pitroda said, “Ab kya hai ’84 ka? Aapne kya kiya 5 saal mein, uski baat kariye. ’84 mein hua to hua. You were voted to create jobs. You were voted to create 200 smart cities. Aapne wo bhi nahi kiya. Aapne kuch nahi kiya isliye aap yahan wahan gup lagate hain. (What about 1984 (riots) now? Talk about what you did in the last five years. What happened in 1984 has happened. So what? You were voted to create jobs. You were voted to create 200 smart cities. You did not even do that. You did nothing, so you keep talking about here and there).”
In April 2019, Pitroda’s remarks that the middle class should not be selfish and should be ready to pay additional taxes to finance the party’s proposed NYAY scheme — which guarantees a minimum income for every poor household — left the Congress party in a pickle.
BJP’s reaction to reappointment
After Pitroda’s reappointment, the BJP attacked the Congress by saying, “The tormentor of the middle class is back.”
BJP IT cell head Amit Malviya added, “Congress hoodwinks India, brings back Sam Pitroda soon after elections.”
“Sam Pitroda’s regressive racist comments targeting middle class, people from South and NorthEast, in particular, were not his personal opinion. He spoke for Rahul Gandhi. He was removed to control damage after his ideas invited severe backlash. Prime Minister Narendra Modi had predicted back in the day that Congress would reinstate him… And they have!” he continued in another post.
With inputs from agencies