Forty-two years ago, an Indian Prime Minister flew to Leh to talk a Ladakhi leader out of starving himself for demanding more rights for the people there. This week, as his son fasted for a cause of his own, it was the memory Congress sought, even though it was no longer in power.
The current BJP-led government has so far been indifferent at best towards the Kokroch Janta Party’s protests at Jantar Mantar, where Sonam Wangchuk has gone on a hunger strike for 20 days and counting.
Congress MP and spokesperson Pawan Khera became the party’s official face as he physically visited the protest site on Friday, July 17, where he met Wangchuk and other members of the Cockroach Janta Party (CJP) like founder Abhijit Debaki, on their sit-in over irregularities in NEET-UG exam and other such issues.
Khaira’s visit came a day after the party’s general secretary (organisation) KC Venugopal expressed solidarity with X, breaking the Congress’ official silence on the protest which the CJP had termed “apolitical” from the beginning.
However, Venugopal stated that his party has raised the demand for the resignation of Minister Dharmendra Pradhan as well.
Rahul Gandhi, the party’s senior leader, has chosen not to visit Dehradun so far, while he was in Dehradun on July 17 to attend a Congress rally on the same issue.
The Congress Party’s gradual shift in position – which led to personal support via a senior envoy – is said to have followed the intervention of Sonia Gandhi, the president of the Congress parliamentary party.
A CPP meeting was held under her chairmanship on Thursday where Congress President and Leader of the Opposition in the Rajya Sabha, Mallikarjun Kharge, and Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha, Rahul Gandhi, were present, along with other MPs.
Read also | Not only Sonam Wangchuk, AISA activists on parallel hunger strike ‘in great danger’ too: ‘Shows the government is heartless’
Thread X also brought Indira back to memory
Sonia Gandhi cited the precedent from 42 years ago, Indira Gandhi’s 1984 visit to Leh to meet Wangchuk’s father, Sonam Wangyal, during his hunger strike to demand Scheduled Tribe (ST) status for Ladakh communities, according to reports in Indian Express And other sources, citing sources.
Before this, RJD spokesperson Sourav Das also shared a post citing the meeting of Indira Gandhi and Sonam Wangyal, and wrote: “The government must learn how to respond and accept accountability.”
He shared a post with a photo of that meeting. The post itself was a response to a right-wing influencer trying to prove that Wangchuk was the product of a false narrative.
That’s 1984 fast
Wangchuk’s father, Sonam Wangyal, born in Shimri village in 1925, served in the paramilitary forces and was a mountaineer who scaled Mount Everest in 1965 at the age of 23. A prominent leader of the Ladakhi community, he served as MLA for Jammu and Kashmir from 1957 to 1967, and subsequently as MLA in 1967 and 1972 from Congress, before becoming a minister in the J&K government in 1975.
As he remained associated with the National Conference alongside the Congress, he was part of a sustained campaign in the 1980s for recognition of Ladakh communities.
In 1984, he went on a five-day hunger strike to press this demand.
Prime Minister Indira Gandhi then traveled to Leh and convinced him to end the fast with her commitment to comply with his demand. She was assassinated later that year by her bodyguards during Operation Bluestar, a military intervention in the Sikh shrine complex of the Golden Temple in Amritsar.
It took another five years of agitation before the Center acted in this manner; In 1989, the President issued the Constitutional Scheduled Tribes (Jammu and Kashmir) Ordinance, granting Scheduled Tribes (ST) status to eight communities initially. Wangyal was sometime expelled from Congress in 1987 for what the party termed anti-party activities. He died in 1998.
Son Sonam Wangchuk has stayed away from active politics, but has been an activist focusing on education, climate and Ladakh rights, having recently spent six months in jail over an agitation seeking special status for the region that was bifurcated as UT when Jammu and Kashmir statehood was wrested in 2019.
Congressional accounts
The Congress remained conspicuously absent from the CJP protest for most of its term, even with the Aam Aadmi Party’s Arvind Kejriwal, the Samajwadi Party’s Dimple Yadav and Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee offering support. Some individual members of Congress supported it.
Party insiders have reportedly cited uneasiness among some Congress leaders over a close alliance with the satirical outfit — which was founded and named after some comments made by the chief justice of India — due to its members being vocal critics of Congress in the past.
Then came the CJP’s recall of the 1984 incident involving Indira Gandhi’s action; And now Sonia Gandhi’s announced intervention, signaling continuity with the Congress tradition of addressing Ladakhi grievances.
Wangchuk, whose health was under clinical monitoring following an order from the Delhi High Court, said on Friday that he intends to continue his fast until at least July 20, when the CJP has called for a march to Parliament to coincide with the start of the monsoon session.
Wangchuk’s changing equation with Modi government mocks Rahul
The Congress’ participation also came after Wangchuk criticized Rahul Gandhi’s absence from Jantar Mantar, calling it a “big insignificance” if the Leader of the Opposition (Lok Sabha) and others stay away. He had allegedly warned that the public would reject such leaders.
This came even as the Congress, including its communications chief Jairam Ramesh and Gujarat leader Jignesh Mevani, defended Rahul Gandhi by referring to his parallel student campaign ‘Chatron Ki Jung’, which was heading to Dehradun on the same Friday that Khaira visited the protest site.
Many pro-Congress handlers on social media also recalled how Wangchuk welcomed the hollowing out of special status under Article 370 for Jammu and Kashmir that led to Ladakh becoming a UT. A March 2023 post also appeared this week showing Wangchuk thanking Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan for his openness to reform. Three years later, Wangchuk was on an indefinite fast demanding the resignation of that same minister.
Read also | How the Modi government’s equation with Sonam Wangchuk collapsed: from ‘brilliant conversation’ to Jantar Mantar
