In Congress circles, Rahul Gandhi is reputed to be a keen footballer, shooter, kick-boxer and martial arts expert, but not known for deceptive googly deliveries. At a recent interaction with Congress spokespersons and TV talking heads at the new party headquarters, Indira Bhawan, New Delhi, Rahul stunned the otherwise captive audience when he drew a cricket analogy to target the party’s in-house ‘sleeper cell’ and mischief-makers. It all began when Jairam Ramesh, head of AICC’s Department of Communication, spoke ahead of Rahul, leaning on cricketing terms that ranged from the ground to umpires and cheerleaders, to present a dismal picture of media that he insisted was completely aligned in favour of the ruling NDA and PM Narendra Modi. Jairam’s charge against mainstream media was that it was not offering a level playing field to the Congress, adding, “…stadium is theirs, pitch is theirs and even umpires are theirs…” Throughout Jairam Ramesh’s speech, Rahul remained attentive with his characteristic smug look. When Ramesh invited Rahul to deliver his keynote speech, according to those present in the audience, the Leader of the Opposition picked up the theme that the chief of media and communication had emphasised. Talking about cricket, he turned to Jairam Ramesh to say that in an intense cricket match, there are instances of players getting run out, hit wicket and dropping catches as if with design and purpose. For the past 48 hours, Rahul’s plain speaking has become a major talking point in party circles. Several prominent leaders and a battery of spokespersons have been wondering why Rahul bowled that googly, and at whom it was aimed. It is an open secret in the Congress that a major reshuffle in the AICC is on the cards, where many heads of department, including those handling communication, are set to lose their jobs. In fact, one interpretation of Jairam’s despair, by stating that ‘stadium, pitch, umpires’ are all against the grand old party, is an admission of his inability to manage media or his competence to effectively handle the AICC Communication Department. In this context, both Pawan Khera and Supriya Shrinate are seen as contenders to replace Jairam Ramesh as head of the media and communication department. It may be noted here that on 30 April 2025, when the Narendra Modi government announced the inclusion of caste in the national population survey, Rahul Gandhi was at the party headquarters and, in full media glare, he quipped, looking at Jairam Ramesh, “Were you not opposed to it?” Incidentally, this is not the first time that Rahul has talked about a ‘BJP sleeper cell’ or party leaders secretly working for Narendra Modi’s cause. In March 2025, Rahul Gandhi in Gujarat had accused some of his party leaders of being hand-in-glove with the BJP. “There is a sleeper cell in Congress. Some leaders have been in Congress but working for the BJP. We need to throw them out, those who work for the BJP despite holding posts in Congress,” Rahul had told party workers at Ahmedabad. Rahul’s remarks made at Indira Bhawan during his interaction with party spokespersons come at a time when the grand old party is getting increasingly jittery over some of the pronouncements made by Shashi Tharoor abroad. A section of the Congress is getting restless and wants the party high command to ‘tame’ and ‘discipline’ Tharoor for defending Narendra Modi’s government’s handling of the Indo-Pak conflict following the Pahalgam terror attack. However, many senior and veteran party leaders feel any action against Tharoor has the potential to boomerang, as patriotic fervour is high across the country. Jairam Ramesh stunned friends and foes alike when he compared the free movement of Pahalgam terrorists to that of Indian MPs travelling abroad. Jairam, while speaking to the news agency ANI, said, “…while allowing terrorists involved in multiple attacks to remain at large. These terrorists from Pahalgam were involved in four attacks and are still roaming freely. Our MPs are roaming, and terrorists are also roaming. We’re raising these questions seriously,” he said. Jairam Ramesh has a penchant for courting controversies. Jairam is often dubbed as anti-industry from when he was UPA’s Minister for Environment and extended his tacit support for urban Maoists like Mahesh Raut. TV news channel Times Now had run a series of stories pointing out how Jairam, in 2013, had written a letter to the then Maharashtra chief minister, Prithviraj Chavan, seeking the release of Raut, who was detained by the local police for his alleged links to Maoists. Raut was arrested for his alleged role in the violent incidents at Bhima-Koregaon. In his letter, Jairam Ramesh had reportedly told Chavan that he had “independently inquired” into the allegations against Raut and discovered that Raut was working well as a Prime Minister’s Rural Development Fellow (PMRDF). Jairam is also author of a book titled, “Intertwined Lives: PN Haksar and Indira Gandhi,” published by Simon & Schuster. When the book was published in 2019, it caused considerable bad blood for making a reference to Sanjay Gandhi, where the author has claimed that Indira’s principal secretary had taken on Sanjay Gandhi. The protracted battle that followed saw Haksar losing the battle for supremacy but leaving the prime minister’s son a deadly enemy who proved to be his nemesis. PN Haksar was not merely principal secretary to Indira Gandhi from the years 1967–1973, when she served as prime minister, but acted as her moral compass and a key figure of Indira’s (in)famous Kitchen Cabinet. The Haryana government, under Bansi Lal, handed over 300 acres of land for Sanjay’s Maruti factory; some 15,000 farmers were evicted to free the land. PN Haksar, who was principal secretary to Indira until 1973, was dropped from his post for opposing the Maruti project. Sanjay got even with Haksar in more than one way, even after the Kashmiri bureaucrat had quit Indira’s office. In Connaught Place in New Delhi, there was a textile shop called Pandit Brothers, whose eighty-year-old owner was the uncle of PN Haksar. During Emergency, Haksar’s uncle had to spend a day in police custody. The reason? Apparently, the towels and napkins at his shop did not carry individual price tags, though the bundles did. Interestingly, in Congress circles, Jairam is famed as a person having many lives. The technocrat from IIT and MIT has a knack for courting controversies and getting away with it. In May 2000, he had described Sonia Gandhi as a ‘Rabri Devi’ and even predicted that under her, the Congress would not come to power in the next 50 years. Sonia was furious and it required some skills of Ahmed Patel and Ambika Soni to prevail upon her to pardon Jairam. Ramesh made the observation in an article “Sonia: no longer the saviour” published in Asiaweek on 12 May, 2000. Speaking to journalist Ritu Sarin, Jairam, then AICC economic wing secretary, had said, “Two years down the line, Sonia is seen as a loser and the morale in the party is low. The hype generated when Sonia became party president has settled down. The mood has swung from one extreme to another. People who saw her as a ticket to nirvana now see her as a ticket to narak (hell).” In 1991, when Narasimha Rao had just taken over, the otherwise quiet prime minister and Congress president had surprised many by blocking Jairam’s entry at 24, Akbar Road. Jairam was working as OSD in the Planning Commission (present-day NITI Aayog) when the probity-conscious Rao ordered 24 Akbar Road to discourage Jairam from entering the party’s national headquarters. At the height of the Ram Setu controversy, Jairam had attacked his ministerial colleague Ambika Soni publicly, demanding her resignation. That brings us to the question of how Jairam gets away each time he gets into trouble. There are several reasons for it. Ramesh’s skill as a draftsman and ability to produce position papers on key economic and technical issues is an asset. Once, his arch-rival Mani Shankar Aiyar was heard complimenting him. Aiyar said if there was a good document in the Congress, it was produced by either him or Jairam. There is also a buzz that some of the sensitive papers from Teen Murti Library were removed during the UPA years. However, the identity of the UPA minister is shrouded in mystery. The author is a Visiting Fellow at the Observer Research Foundation. A well-known political analyst, he has written several books, including ‘24 Akbar Road’ and ‘Sonia: A Biography’. Views expressed in the above piece are personal and solely those of the author. They do not necessarily reflect News18’s views.