Mrs Sonia Gandhi, president of India's main opposition Congress party, offered to resign from her post yesterday following a revolt by three senior party members, a television network reported.
The offer of resignation was immediately rejected by members of the powerful Congress Working Committee, according to the private STAR television network.
Three powerful members of the party - Mr Sharad Pawar, Mr Purno Sangma and Mr Tariq Anwar - have questioned Italian-born Mrs Gandhi's claim to run on the Congress ticket in a bid to become India's next prime minister. They have also criticised moves to stifle debate on the issue within the party.
The TV network reported that Mrs Gandhi walked out of the meeting after submitting her resignation. Clearly angered, Mrs Gandhi had earlier held a series of meetings yesterday with Congress leaders to decide what action should be taken against this breach of party discipline and attempt to destroy her bid to become prime minister.
The demand by the three leaders provoked street clashes earlier in the day between their supporters and followers of Mrs Gandhi, widening the divide in the party in the run-up period for the federal elections.
The first signs of a revolt in the upper Congress echelons emerged over the weekend. In a letter to Mrs Gandhi, the former defence minister Mr Sharad Pawar, the former lower house speaker Mr P.A. Sangma and Tariq Anawar, an ex-party spokesman, declared their opposition to her being projected as prime minister in elections next September because of her foreign roots and lack of political and administrative experience.
In a party often unquestioning of Mrs Gandhi's leadership leading party members have publicly condemned the letter as heresy. And though the Congress Working Committee, the party's highest decision-making body is expected to close ranks behind Mrs Gandhi, analysts said the dissidence was bound to throw the Congress into turmoil.
Although the letter highlighted Mrs Gandhi's leadership qualities in holding Congress together over the past year, it suggested that the party itself should recommend an amendment to India's constitution to ensure that the offices of president, vice-president and prime minister are held only by citizens born in India. It also hinted that a foreign national as prime minister could compromise India's security concerns. Mrs Gandhi became an Indian citizen nearly 15 years after marrying Rajiv Gandhi and only after he entered politics in 1983. Mrs Gandhi, who holds no electoral office, came close to becoming prime minister last month after the ruling Hindu-nationalist-led government lost its parliamentary majority but was thwarted by a regional party that declined to support her because of her Italian origin.
Party sources admitted that Mrs Gandhi faced a difficult choice. They said she could either bow before the challenge, step down and lose face or expel the three dissidents who are powerful regional leaders, thereby losing their support in an election that promises to be a close call.
Mr Pawar commands a huge following in the politically important state of Maharashtra in the west, of which Bombay is the capital, while Mr Sangma controls over 20 MPs from the north-eastern states.
The revolt in the Congress party has been welcomed by the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party, which has already launched an aggressive election campaign in which it is focusing on Mrs Gandhi's foreign origins.
