NEW DELHI (Reuters) -- India's Congress party faces a deep crisis following the expulsion of three key senior leaders ahead of the country's general elections in September, newspapers and commentators said Saturday.
They said the expulsion of the leaders, who said Sonia Gandhi should be not be projected as the party's prime ministerial candidate because she was born in Italy and was inexperienced, reflected the lack of democracy in the nation's oldest political grouping.Gandhi resigned as Congress chief after the rebels openly criticized her. She has continued to ignore pleas to return.
The ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) took advantage of the disarray in its political rival to accuse Congress of promoting "dynasty over democracy" through the expulsions.
The Indian Express newspaper, in an editorial headlined "Tyranny of sycophancy," said the expulsions marked an "all-time low in the democratic functioning of the pre-eminent political party."
"Indeed, the Congress leadership certainly squandered yet another opportunity that came its way to invest in the party's apparatus," the Hindu newspaper said in an editorial.
It said the party leaders allowed sycophancy to rule the roost and declared the party's dependence on India's celebrated Nehru-Gandhi dynasty.
Gandhi's husband, mother-in-law and grandfather-in-law have held the office of prime minister for 38 of India's 52 years of independence.
Congress workers have kept up their siege outside Gandhi's home in Delhi pleading for her return as party chief.
The Hindustan Times newspaper said the damage caused by the rebels may hurt Gandhi in the short-run but could cause more harm to the party.
"It is imperative that Gandhi returns to the helm if only to save Congressmen from doubts and the party from needless distractions and dissensions," it said.
The Congress Working Committee, the party's highest decision-making group which decided to expel the leaders, has called a meeting of the All India Congress Committee on May 25. The party delegates are likely to endorse the expulsion then.
The AICC is a larger body of elected Congress delegates that formally appointed Gandhi as party chief last year.
Meanwhile, the rebels, led by their most prominent leader, Sharad Pawar, have announced they would form a new political party.
Pawar told reporters in the western city of Pune that the process of forming a new party would begin in the next two to three days.
"People have come to me from every district. Their reaction has been very good," he said, adding that he had the support of some members of the CWC.
The formation of a new party could tilt the political balance ahead of the September polls.