After six months of anger, confusion and frustration, expressed privately and publicly, a party report that blamed the media and the social media for its abject defeat, and embarrassing verbal skirmishes among its members, the Congress has finally begun to show signs of life. “The party is moving towards some movement,” a young leader wryly phrased it.
Indeed, the activity in the party goes beyond its current efforts to protect Jawaharlal Nehru’s reputation as a “global statesman, institution-builder, and architect of a secular, modern India,” and resist the Narendra Modi government’s efforts to strip him of his many attributes. Of course, the Congress is using Nehru’s 125th birth anniversary both to exhort the party faithful to take inspiration from the past as they confront a difficult future, and to stress the party’s continuing relevance not just in the country but globally (as it did at a just- concluded international seminar).
But as the battle for the appropriation or, more accurately, interpretation of Nehru rages on in heated studio face-offs, far from the arc lights, a candid — almost no-holds barred — introspection exercise has also begun within the Congress.
Closed-door sessionsIn closed-door sessions that started late October and that will continue till the end of this month, the party’s top 200-odd leaders, divided into small groups, have been debating the Congress’s future, telling party Vice-President Rahul Gandhi what they think needs to be done. Each day’s discussion is summarised so that succeeding sets of discussants have a sense of what has already been placed on the table. The format may be informal, but it is the first structured attempt by the party to brainstorm since the Congress’s electoral rout earlier this year.
If the discussions predictably focus on the need to rearticulate the party’s ideology and transform the moribund organisation into a fighting machine, party sources said the exercise — by reaching out to a cross section of the party’s leadership across the country — is working on a much-needed course correction through a deliberative exercise.
Conversations with several of those who have attended these gatherings indicate they have been surprisingly frank and open. In an organisation where discussions even at the rare meetings of its highest decision-making body, the Congress Working Committee, tend to be predetermined and skilfully choreographed by the party’s top managers, this has been a welcome change, they stress.
Indeed, it has gone a long way in neutralising the hostility towards the party’s future leader, Mr. Gandhi, who has been present at every discussion. This is especially since the management of the meetings has been taken out of the hands of the usual set of party managers whose task was to deflect any unpleasant truth-telling. The result: Mr. Gandhi, party sources say, has begun to accept the criticism of his way of running the party with “a level of equanimity.” Congress President Sonia Gandhi, with whose concurrence this structure has been adopted, has thus far attended just one meeting apparently to see how Mr. Gandhi is getting along.
Mr. Gandhi, for instance, has now agreed to replace the Youth Congress elections he had introduced, which he had wanted to replicate in the parent party with the nomination process, provided it is proven that it was being done on the basis of a “system of fair feedback.” This is a significant softening, as it was widely believed in the party that money and muscle power as well as “influence” had vitiated the election process, “paralysing” the Youth Congress. Indeed, immediately after the 2014 general election, at a Youth Congress meeting where a majority demanded a change in the system, Mr. Gandhi had stood firm. But he now appears to have finally accepted the shortcomings of the election process, and has opened himself to suggestions on how to change that process.
Ideological clarity neededMeanwhile, the discussions on ideology have boiled down to the “need to be pluralistic without looking like a Muslim party, to retain the minority vote without annoying the liberal Hindu mainstream, and choosing a path so that we are not stigmatised as anti-upper caste in north India,” as a former minister who attended one of the meetings said. Indeed, the Congress is very conscious of the fact that it is no longer seen as “an umbrella party” attracting the votes of Brahmins, Dalits and Muslims alike. The urgent need for clarity on ideology, so that there is no confusion in the ranks on core issues, has also been stressed.
But if issues of organisation and ideology have dominated the discussions, what has come through forcefully is that while course correction on these fronts is essential, it is leadership that will be key to the party making a comeback. It was pointed out, that the Bharatiya Janata Party, after a decade in retreat, saw its fortunes transformed not because of ideological sharpness or organisational strength, but through the appearance of a strong dynamic leader, Narendra Modi. A majority of the participants at successive meetings, therefore, have stressed to Mr. Gandhi that he “must lead from the front.”
There is growing acceptance that the party must abandon its “born to rule” mindset, and realise that it is not a party of governance any more. It, therefore, needs to take on its role as the principal opposition more seriously. In this, since Ms. Gandhi has made it clear that the time for the handing over of power to her son is near, Mr. Gandhi needs to be seen to be assuming that commanding position both in Parliament and outside, as a former Chief Minister said at one of the meetings.
Publicly, there have been echoes of this sentiment. Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah recently said Mr. Gandhi should become “more assertive” and engage more closely with people, while Congress General Secretary Digvijaya Singh — who has the knack of anticipating events — made a similar comment: “It’s a general feeling of Congress workers that Congress has always encouraged younger people to lead the party…the time has come when Rahul Gandhi should take charge.”
With the recent loss of governments in Maharashtra and Haryana, an anticipated shrinking of seats in Jammu and Kashmir and Jharkhand, and the split in its Tamil Nadu unit, Mr. Gandhi as the indisputably chosen leader cannot afford to lose any more time. He has to lead from the front, and he has to select his new team soon. And the momentum that these monthlong meetings have created must culminate in a concrete plan of action.
Or else, even this effort to channel the party’s anger and frustration in a constructive manner will go waste.
smita.g@thehindu.co.in
