India’s Ruling-Party Chief Quits Parliament and an Advisory Post

Sonia Gandhi, head of India’s ruling party, resigned Thursday from Parliament to defuse a growing controversy over whether she illegally held two political posts at once.

However, the country’s most powerful woman said she would run again in the by-election for her seat, a contest she is almost certain to win and which would return her to the Lok Sabha, the lower house, within six months.

Gandhi, 59, announced that she was quitting Parliament and her position on the government’s National Advisory Council after opposition politicians accused her of violating a decades-old law forbidding legislators from holding other jobs offering pay or perks. Her chairmanship of the advisory panel was deemed such a post.

“I have done this because I think it is the right thing to do,” Gandhi told reporters outside her home near the Parliament building. She said the decision to step down was in keeping with her “standards of public morality and personal values,” and added that she expected her constituents in rural northern India, and the rest of the country, to understand her wishes.

She will remain leader of the Congress Party, which has governed India through a coalition since 2004. Widow of an assassinated former prime minister, Gandhi is widely believed to be the real power behind the current premier, Manmohan Singh, and her influence, as well as the overall political landscape, is likely to remain relatively unchanged.

But by giving up her seat, at least temporarily, Gandhi appears to be trying to claim the moral high ground and to neutralize accusations of unseemly attempts by supporters to keep her in office. On Wednesday, the government abruptly adjourned Parliament and was reportedly considering introducing a rule change that would allow Gandhi to hold on to her Lok Sabha seat and advisory council post.

“For the last two days, some people in the country were trying to create an impression that Parliament was being misused for my benefit,” Gandhi said. “This has hurt me.”

Opponents criticized her resignation as a grandstanding maneuver by a cornered politician.

“Mrs. Sonia Gandhi’s party and her government was caught red-handed trying to subvert the constitution and the Parliament,” said Arun Jaitley, a leader of the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party. “She became a victim of her own conspiracy.”

Congress Party activists thronged outside Gandhi’s home in a show of support reminiscent of the public adulation she received two years ago when she declined the prime minister’s job, opting instead to wield influence behind the scenes.

First elected in 1999, the Italian-born Gandhi rocketed to the heights of power largely on the strength of her membership, through marriage, in India’s most famous political dynasty, a ruling family with roots tracing to the nation’s first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru. Her mother-in-law, Indira Gandhi, was Nehru’s daughter, and her husband, Rajiv, was Indira’s son. Indira, then prime minister, was assassinated in 1984, Rajiv in 1991.

The family commands allegiance and reverence throughout India. Even so, its political home, the Congress Party, was in disarray until Sonia Gandhi emerged from years of seclusion after her husband’s assassination to help revive its fortunes.

Many analysts credit her with resuscitating the party and guiding it back to power.

“The Congress Party is a very heterogeneous party, and what binds them all is loyalty to her,” said Prabhu Ghate, a political columnist here. “She’s managed the party certainly quite well.”

As head of the National Advisory Council, a panel of experts and activists who counsel the government on development issues, Gandhi helped shepherd through such policies as a national employment plan to guarantee work for poor families.

But her role on the body caught the attention of political foes after another legislator was forced to resign this week for serving on a state film development board, in violation of the law banning lawmakers from simultaneously holding “offices of profit.” Although many members of the Indian Parliament hold such positions, Gandhi became an opportune target.

Whether choosing to leave Parliament, if only briefly, will damage or bolster her standing remains to be seen. Her decision to turn down the premiership was widely viewed as a publicrelations masterstroke in a country where few leaders have willingly relinquished power, burnishing her image as a devoted public servant.

That she will recapture her seat in the by-election is almost a foregone conclusion. Gandhi’s current constituency, Rae Bareli in the state of Uttar Pradesh, lies next to Amethi, where she first won election to parliament. She stepped aside so her son Rahul could run in Amethi, a seat held by his father and grandmother. He succeeded, and many believe his mother is grooming him to follow in their footsteps.