It is not just India Inc or the common investor on Dalal Street who does not believe the assurances by prime minister Manmohan Singh and former finance minister Pranab Mukherjee that an economic revival is round the corner.

The Congress party also shares this commonly held dim view of these assurances that have been doled out by these two leaders from time to time.

Reflecting the party position, an editorial in the Congress Sandesh in its June 2012 issue states; “The prime minister and the finance minister have assured that measures will be taken to kick start the stagnating economy. They have done it before.”

It almost implies that they have done it before and it has not happened. The concluding part of the editorial only expresses a fond hope that the economic revival shall happen:” “Let us have the confidence that it will happen again in a short while, and the economic growth will again pick up as in the past.”

Close on the heels of Sonia Gandhi’s advice to partymen to shed all manner of factional behaviour, concern over the growing trend in Congress was voiced in the latest issue of the party’s mouthpiece. Blaming ‘personal ambitions’ of some people for the poor show of the party in elections, the editorial said the key to success lies in ‘unity and fortitude’.

“All that is lacking is that the personal ambitions of some people are coming in the way and party men defeat the selected party men who are chosen to represent the party in elections,” the editorial says while emphasising that party can provide the leadership to make India the power it has set out to become.