Cong Presidents post a family monopoly: Advani

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

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

Sonia Gandhi was elected party president for the fourth time unopposed last year. The tenure of the presidentship has also been increased to five years from three years.

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

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

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

He also recalled how the Jan Sangh members, who were viewed as a liability to the Janata Party leadership, parted ways and launched BJP, describing that phase as "extremely agonising" in his long political life.

He said that in his writings he used to describe Janata Party as being in the grip of a "lemmings complex", a term which is also being used by dailies today to comment on the state of affairs in the present Government.

Lemmings are a rodent in Scandinavian countries, who for no explicable reason are believed to commit mass suicide. This is, however, scientifically not proven, he said.