Congress in disarray: Rahul Gandhi must wake up and smell the coffee

Even if the mountain seems too high to climb, lying on the floor will take Rahul Gandhi nowhere. Nor will the reported plan to boycott the upcoming state polls till EVMs are replaced by paper ballot

Nobel Laureate C V Raman apparently left an unfinished experiment overnight and next morning observed changes which led to the discovery of the Raman Effect. The Congress party seems to be waiting for some such fortuitous development for an uptick in its fortunes. It should remember that when someone attributed Raman’s discovery to chance, the great scientist replied, “Accidents don’t happen to fools.”

It would be exceedingly foolish for the Congress to persist in its present default mode. It must prepare for the legislative elections in three states barely four months away. Rahul Gandhi seems intent on following through what was seen as a melodramatic resignation. Clearly, the matriarch of the family, Sonia Gandhi, still sees a role for the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty in running the Congress. Nothing else would explain her accepting the role of the leader of the Congress Parliamentary Party.

Renunciation is just the wrong kind of lesson the Gandhi scion should have taken from his party’s election debacle. His election campaign was lively and aggressive. He presented a credible and alternative vision of India to that of the incumbent Prime Minister, Narendra Modi. A post-mortem of the campaign may point to the pit falls he could have avoided. However, the Modi campaign was not without blemishes either.

Rahul Gandhi and the Congress have to deal with the negative public perception about them. Though that is to a large extent created by the propaganda machine of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), it is also based on their own past behaviour. The Congress and the Nehru-Gandhi family were successfully projected as possessing a sense of entitlement by Prime Minister Modi and his party. Whether this is true or not Rahul Gandhi’s ejection can be projected as indirectly blaming the electorate, reinforcing precisely the image of an entitled scion. A political leader cannot afford to be disillusioned.

Despite a plethora of advice that he should be allowed to go his own way there is no obvious candidate who can replace him as Congress president. He has also shut the door on even leading the party in the Lok Sabha. There is no public clarity about the role he sees for himself.

A non-entity as Congress president will not solve the party’s problems. The dynastic politics of the Congress provides the glue that holds it together at the national level. Without the family, the party could start disintegrating with regional satraps going their own way, especially as state elections begin to come up.

Even if he does not want to be the party president, Rahul Gandhi should carve out a new and effective political role for himself taking a leaf out of the book of other young leaders like Akhilesh Yadav, Hemant Soren and Arvind Kejriwal who have pulled up their socks to gear up for the impending political battles. Instead of sulking they are reacting to political developments. Kejriwal has in fact set a new political agenda of safety of women in the capital by announcing free Metro and bus travel for them, putting the BJP on the back foot. And this despite the fact that in its primary area of influence, the national capital, his Aam Adami Party was only number three in all the seven Lok Sabha constituencies. Rahul Gandhi should also learn from Jagan Reddy in Andhra Pradesh who struggled for ten years before his party was gifted an electoral victory by the people or from M K Stalin who also struggled for long before the stellar performance of his party in Tamil Nadu.

 

Rahul Gandhi will undoubtedly have to address the structural deficiencies of his party, priortitising those states that will be facing elections soon. Instead of reorganising the Karanataka state unit the party needs to act quickly in crucial states like Maharashtra, Haryana, Jharkhand, Delhi and Bihar, where elections are due in the near future. Maharashtra, Haryana and Jharkhand elections are scheduled as early as December this year. The BJP has already readied its strategy for these states, its alliances are in place, it is conducting opinion polls to assess the public mood and the process of candidate selection has started. The Congress, on the other hand, is yet to hold even a meeting of its leaders in these states to discuss their election plans.

The sense of disarray and despondency in the party is such that in Maharashtra party leaders are making a beeline for the BJP. In Delhi, the party is divided between those who are for or against the sacking of Sheila Dixit as party president. The party’s state president in Haryana has said that those wanting to get rid of him will have to shoot him first. Things are in such disarray that former Congress Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda is apparently mulling forming his own party to contest the state elections.

State assembly election results could follow a different pattern from the general election. In fact, Rahul Gandhi should actively ensure that his party repeats its performance of the state assembly elections in Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Chattisgarh. Just as in these states, many Congressmen believe that the state leaders should be given charge of the elections instead of general secretaries sent from Delhi. The Congress needs to firm up its alliances in Maharashtra and Jharkhand and begin the process of seat distribution and candidate selection.

However, for all this to happen, Rahul Gandhi will have to climb out of bed. The more he focuses on his personal failings the less of a politician he will become.His party was not the only one which was defeated by the BJP. Others, albeit smaller parties, fared even worse. At this rate, neither he nor his party would achieve anything. Both need a leap of faith and a degree of optimism. Even if the mountain seems to too high to climb, lying on the floor will take Rahul Gandhi nowhere. Nor will the reported hare-brained plan to boycott the upcoming state elections till electronic voting is replaced by paper ballots.

Twitter: @Bharatitis