Tarun Chugh
History reveals the truth for the people despite all attempts to manufacture lies. Rahul Gandhi’s insult of the OBC community should not surprise anyone. People with long term memory know that this has been done before. It’s just in the DNA of Congress to insult the OBC community.
Late Rajiv Gandhi as leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha in 1990 opposed Vishwanath Pratap Singh, the then Prime Minister, who announced the implementation of Mandal Commission Report. The epochal moment sought to give effect to reservation to other backward castes (OBCs) to the extent of 27 per cent. That was a decade of Congress hey days, with party having won 404 Lok Sabha seats in 2014 with over 49 per cent vote share.
Rajiv Gandhi stood in the Lok Sabha to oppose implementation of the OBC reservation. The Bharatiya Janata Party leaders Atal Bihari Vajpayee and LK Advani had welcomed the decision of the VP Singh government. They argued that the time had come to recognise the demands of the OBCs.
The stand of Rajiv Gandhi was almost unilateral. The OBC leaders within the Congress were appalled at the decision. They were shocked that Rajiv Gandhi was disconnected with the masses.
Soon, Congress was reduced to a party with 200 Lok Sabha seats even when the party came to power in alliance with other political parties. Congress’ fortuned was cut by half in the Lok Sabha, solely for its anti-OBC mindset. The space vacated by Congress was occupied by the regional parties. They mushroomed all across the country. The political parties espousing the cause of the OBCs came up in Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh and elsewhere. They ate into the vote base of Congress. Even after three decades, Congress has mostly lost its vote base in states where the OBC identity-based regional parties cropped up.
The BJP was clear from its beginning that the OBC deserved social justice and the party’s leadership was steadfast in their support. The BJP’s support to the OBC was also manifested in a strong leadership of the party from the backward castes. They were at the forefront of the party workers in several states. They also took the leadership of the party and even became chief ministers.
The journey of Congress and the BJP is in a sharp contrast. Congress went into a steep political fall since 1990s. The BJP rapidly rose in its political stock since 1990s. The Congress base shrank. The BJP vote base expanded. Congress kept hitting lower and lower in its Lok Sabha tally. The BJP tally in the Lok Sabha kept rising.
In the 1989 Lok Sabha elections, Congress had won 197 seats. The BJP had won 85 Lok Sabha seats in the same election. Three decades later, the BJP won 303 Lok Sabha seats in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. Congress for a second time in a row could not win enough seats to gain the status of the leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha. The people of the country punished Congress for its anti-OBC bias in the last three decades.
Rahul Gandhi repeated the same mistake that his father had committed in the Lok Sabha in 1990. There is not a single independent voice in the country which didn’t admonish him for his 2019 election speech in Kolar, Karnataka in which he asked “why all thieves have Modi surname”. This was an outrageous statement by a person who was president of Congress. He had been a member of the Lok Sabha multiple times. He is also 52 years old. He couldn’t have made the scandalous and outrageous statement to question the integrity of the OBC community.
Worse is the fact that there is no remorse on the part of Rahul Gandhi. He has occasions to express remorse and apologise in the Surat Court. But he chose not to apologise. It’s beyond understanding that a number of lawyers who hold senior positions in Congress would not have gauged the consequences of Rahul Gandhi not apologising for his defamatory statement.
Rajiv Gandhi’s anti-OBC stand had cut Congress’ strength by half. Rahul Gandhi’s stand against the OBC will also bring similar wrath, and the Opposition party given its current strength may find among the regional parties sitting in one corner of the Lok Sabha with handful members after the 2024 general elections.
(The author is the national general secretary of the Bharatiya Janata Party)
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