This is crazy advice. What does she want to do? Destroy the party? I mean, what has ethics and morality got to do with Congress politics anyway? Isn't it bit like asking a Tyrannosaurus Rex to exhibit better table manners or do something about his bad breath?

I, for one, find it a crying shame that a party which had selflessly provided this nation with some of its most scintillating moments should find itself being lectured to in this schoolmarmish manner at Pachmarhi.

The time has come to publicly acknowledge that life would not have been the same for us Indians, if the Congress hadn't been around to put a little extra something into it. It's our collective amnesia that causes us to overlook the various acts of kindnesses that it has extended to usfrom time to time. And amnesia, as we all know, is the mother of ingratitude.

Therefore, to mark the Pachmarhi session, I have taken the trouble to put together this small, personal tribute to a 113-year-old party. A party that gave us our independence from the British and our dependence on the International Monetary Fund. A party which gave us the idea of a Gandhian swarajya and a taste of a Gandhian Emergency. A party that gave us the slogan of garibi hatao, and then promptly proceeded to get us even deeper into poverty. A party that gave us socialism of the Nehruvian kind and socialites of the Amitabh Bachchanian variety. A party that gave us the Dandi March of Mahatma Gandhi and the Dandy March of Rajiv `run for freedom' Gandhi.

There are those who say that the Congress is a thoroughly corrupt party. I may even agree with this assessment. But look what it has done to the mathematical abilities of this nation.

The party may not have succeeded in removing mass illiteracy in all its yearsof governance, but it has certainly made us faster in doing sums. Right from the days when the Mundhra scandal surfaced in the relatively innocent '50s, to the more serous affairs involving securities and urea that surfaced in the nasty '90s, we've had a lot to figure out.

Little teasers or complicated equations, as the case may be: If Mr Q transferred half-a-million dollars from his Swiss bank account, how much would he have left? Or if a hundred 100-rupee bundles fill one-tenth of a VIP suitcase, how many bundles will Harshad Mehta require to fill the entire suitcase? Or if X got Y as a kickback in 1988, when will Y kick back at X?

And it's not just figures. The Congress has made all the difference to our knowledge of geography as well. How many people in this country could have identified Stockholm, Geneva or the Channel Islands on the map before this party decided to fill in the gaps for us?

A more serious charge against the Congress is that it has presided over more fratricidal killings, than evenRwanda has been witness to. Now this may well be the case, but think of all the colour and excitement this orgy of blood-letting has brought to our lives. Bodies wherever you look, sobbing mothers and wives, Shiv Sena leaders prowling around the city with guns in their cars, police personnel getting valuable target practice on real people.

Come to think of it, a Mani Ratnam couldn't have made a blockbuster like Bombay without the Congress having twiddled its thumbs while Bombay burned. Which means that it is the Congress that is ultimately responsible for that fabulous Humma-humma number featuring Manisha Koirala.

Most important of all, the Congress gave this country something it never had since the days of the Mughals -- a real, living dynasty, complete with an empress, palaces and courtiers. The courtiers, to my mind, constitute the best part of the deal. It's they who keep the spirit of the Congress going by striking the right back-breaking postures, by holding extensive ``free andfrank'' discussions on how wonderful the Nehru-Gandhi legacy has been and by punctuating their conversations with the mandatory ``Madam says'' and ``Madam feels'' every two minutes or so.

There are many who find this trajectory from the era when the Congress sang freedom's song to the days when it is content to bleat Madam's praises a tragic state of affairs. But look at it this way, at least they haven't taken to rolling down Janpath to catch Soniaji's eye like Jayalalitha's minions have had to do. At least, not yet.