Cong President''s post a ''family monopoly'', says Advani

New Delhi, Feb 6 (PTI) In a veiled attack on Sonia Gandhi,senior BJP leader L K Adani today said during the freedommovement, Congress president was chosen for only a tenure butnow the post has become a "family monopoly".

"Those were the days when every year the Congress wouldhave a new President. How much things have changed since!Nowadays, Party Presidentship seems to have become a familymonopoly, and that too for life," Advani said in his latestblog posting.

He said even Mahatma Gandhi, who commanded extraordinaryinfluence over the Congress all his life became President ofthe Party only once in 1924.

Sonia Gandhi was elected party president for the fourthtime unopposed last year. The tenure of the presidentship hasalso been increased to five years from three years.

In his blog Advani also sought to draw a parallel betweenthe fate of the Janata Party after it lost elections "badly"in 1980 and the position of the UPA Government today facingseries of corruption charges and allegations.

"It was during this agonising phase (in 1980) that I onceremarked: This Janata Party seems to be in a suicidal mood...

It makes one wonder if the UPA Government also can be deemedto be in a suicidal mood," he said.

He also recalled how the Jan Sangh members, who wereviewed as a liability to the Janata Party leadership, partedways and launched BJP, describing that phase as "extremelyagonising" in his long political life.

He said that in his writings he used to describe JanataParty as being in the grip of a "lemmings complex", a termwhich is also being used by dailies today to comment on thestate of affairs in the present Government.

Lemmings are a rodent in Scandinavian countries, who forno explicable reason are believed to commit mass suicide. Thisis, however, scientifically not proven, he said.