Shiban Khaibri
One thing is beyond comprehension as to why it makes many ill at ease to see Congress Party getting poll drubbings and especially following losing Assam , even senior leaders like Digvijay Singh going to the extent of suggesting a major surgery. Shashi Tharoor and P. Chidambaram too have expressed themselves more or less on the same lines and that also not in explicit hush hush manner. It is, however, understood that the Party’s President in waiting, Rahul Gandhi currently holding the reins of the Party as its vice President was likely to be elevated to the top Party post of its President. Let us not be content with the impression that he has not been indulging himself in Party affairs or in the last UPA 2 Government affairs, glimpses of which can be recalled in what the then Commerce Minister Jayanti Natrajan made public or how he had so much of unwritten powers so as to tear off the ordinance papers passed by the cabinet and that also when the PM was on foreign official tour. It is another face of the coin that he did not tender his resignation immediately after touching New Delhi. Well, that speaks more about the level of efficacy of the powerful office of the Prime Minister under UPA regime. Rahul Gandhi has been party and not just privy to most of the key decisions of the Congress during the last three years . It is to be seen that whether he shall hold himself accountable too after taking major decisions as the Party President.
The immediate task before the party, amidst its struggle to find relevance in the current political landscape, is to face UP elections, now only less than a year away and it seems that since the Party is in acute shortage of charismatic leaders to take poll campaign to its logical or some planned levels in UP, there are some low simmering voices emanating from within the state unit to induct Priyanka Gandhi Vadra into the poll campaign. The grip and the hold on UP politics gained on account of her frequent sojourns of Amethi constituency by the BJP leader Ms. Smriti Irani could pose a challenge to Ms. Priyanka . It may be recalled that because of the campaigning, even though belatedly, Smriti Irani succeeded in cutting votes of Rahul by a huge margin in the general elections of 2014.On the other hand, it would be an uphill task to counter Ms. Mayawati , BSP chief who knows more about UP politics than even the other contenders like Akhilesh Yadav of the SP and presently the CM as also Ms. Priyanka Vadra of the Congress, the fact well known by the Congress leadership. In other words, the immediate test to the stewardship of Rahul Gandhi lay in how at least he romps home a few seats in the Assembly to mark its presence in the House, the imminent coronation brings in its wake this handy test of the sorts.
Not only that, as information gathering exercise throws light on these aspects, the Party wants to ape the BJP style in inducting younger faces in the party and keep the older or the senior ones some steps away to make the “young blood” (if people past 45 or 50 are categorized as young in Congress) act in somewhat unfettered way only to get directions from the Party President. Organizational overhaul seems inevitable as a measure of infusing life into the dormancy that seems to have engulfed the Party following successive reversals in elections and losing state after state and even not reaping substantially from the coalitions built up with other Parties like the DMK , the Left and other regional Parties barring the one in Bihar last year that too with the help of RJD and the JDU. The other measures to repair the Party are reportedly in entrusting Sonia Gandhi with the responsibility to head the CPP. In other words, in the name of rejig , Sonia Gandhi, Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka (Gandhi) Vadra are inducted in Congress to better the lot of the Party and are vehemently in disagreement that it could mean anything but promoting one dynasty and treating the Party next to that. The recent jib of Smt. Sonia Gandhi at Modi “not to behave like an emperor” has been returned by the ruling Party with the “Prince to be made as the emperor”. The democracy within the Party could mean nothing beyond following directions from one controlling entity. The limits of suppressing opinions and likes and suggestions lay in what was witnessed in Arunachal Pradesh, Assam and in Uttrakhand where dedicated Congress activists and known leaders raised their voices of revolt and had to leave the Party as a last resort since they, despite lot many efforts could not get any encouragement or even a serious hearing to their pleas.
Although measures of overhauling are not yet finalized, yet the invisible division among the ranks under the “old guard and the new guard” has taken place and the “veterans” won’t have Rahul Gandhi experience a cake walk unless their views are accommodated. Can it happen? It could not happen under Rajiv Gandhi with such a massive mandate as at times he felt helpless and that speaks for his lamenting over “Out of a Rupee only 25 paise reach the needy in Indian villages”. He could not prevail upon or contain the assertive role of the “veterans” . It was only Indira Gandhi who put a wave of resistance to such elements and did not bother to form a new Party christened as “Congress(I)”. The impending decision to prescribe “low profile ” to the old guard shall result in brewing of a strong dissent and all the leaders who are opinionated at a rejig necessarily are not in agreement to see Rahul Ji heading the Party and would prefer a status quo. Even the allies like the NCP openly favoured for continuance of Sonia Ji as its President rather than Rahul Gandhi. When asked for reactions and “matured views” , allies of Congress like the RJD and the Communists wanted Congress to “return to Nehruvian ideology” which meant adherence to obsolete economic models based on controls, protectionism and socialistic colour with little scope of reforms in tune with the changing world order besides selective secularism and appeasement of vote Banks.
The rejig including elevation of Rahul Ji has in its kit very little to change the fortunes of the Party. A few decisions of Rahul Gandhi in west Bengal and in Kerala in respect of the recently concluded assembly polls were interesting in that while in West Bengal Congress paired with the Left, it fought the Left in Kerala and got drubbings in both the states. So if the proof of pudding is in its tasting then the type of political strategies like these put a question mark on the expertise and the acumen of Rahul Gandhi especially when people can read much into Sonia Gandhi being CPP chief, Rahul Gandhi as President and Priyanka Vadra as UP poll campaigner for the Congress. Always harping on “Suit Boot Ki Sarkar”, crediting of Rs. 15 lac in individual account, Garib, Mazdoor , Kissan like over played overspent words to beat Modi government with, has very little returns in store for the Party. To counter the oratory skills of Modi Ji , one has to work very hard , for that matter even confront the speaking dexterity of Ministers like Jaitley, Smriti Irani and others is not that easy for the new President of the Congress Party.
A political analysis in dispassionate form would suggest that it was not prudent to prescribe some “rest” for the grand old Party to resurrect in an entirely new form as in Democracy, there are no such restrictions. However, why should the Party not discharge its duties as a responsible opposition Party and strengthen the tenets of democracy instead of what we have been seeing otherwise in Parliament. Besides, it has to come out of the web of unwarranted and avoidable policies like we saw in coining phrases like Hindu terror and maligning the entire community and bailing out Pakistan either intentionally or unwittingly but unintentionally or try to put controversies rolling in sensitive matters like Batla encounter or dish out unjustified statements like from the former Prime Minister that “minorities have the first right on the country’s resources” or the former Home Minister sending “advisories” to State Governments not to harass members of a particular community in suspected terror cases. It has to come clean unambiguously in its fight against money power in politics, for that particularly all political Parties, as we watched on different TV Channels about sting operations in “managing” or even “bartering” seats for the ensuing elections for Rajya Sabha and forge a close cooperation with all contesting Parties to fight this evil of polluting politics and political institutions in the country.
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