It was speculated that Chavan may join the BJP as it was learnt that the party had offered him Rajya Sabha candidacy. BJP leaders have claimed that more Congress MLAs will soon follow the suit and join the party.
Chavan was heavily criticised for quitting Congress as many accused him of doing so to stave off the ire of the Enforcement Directorate. One cannot deny the privilege of being protected by the system when he/she is in power, but the reasons cited by Chavan over his decision cannot be sidelined either. Chavan claimed that the time for Congress was to take to the road with the common people to raise their issues and stated that the party did not take his suggestions into consideration. He cited lack of teamwork and ineffective operating style within the Congress for his decision to join BJP. Chavan’s statements point a finger directly at Rahul Gandhi and his loyalist senior Congress leaders’ method of functioning.
Chavan may have left the Congress for his own benefit but he is still a heavyweight politician who has held key portfolios in his long political career. Therefore, the Congress must ponder upon his words since most of the common party workers seem to agree with his views. Lok Sabha elections are around the corner and instead of discussing allocation of seats, campaign planning and organising programmes for party workers, Rahul Gandhi is busy with the Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra. The question is how will the party stay united? Congress is losing out on their long-time leaders one after the other, which is causing panic amongst their workers.
Apart from Chavan, there are many senior Congress leaders who have left Congress over the last two years and this has weakened the party irreparably. This clearly means that Sonia Gandhi, Rahul Gandhi, Priyanka Gandhi and their senior citizen colleagues have failed to revive the party. This has yet again raised the discussions around whether the Congress needs to be freed from the ‘Gandhi’ tag. Many have already expressed their opinions over this and not just political scientists, but some of the Congress leaders themselves believe that the party cannot be revived until and unless it is dissolved and re-formed under a non-Gandhi leadership.
Some political analysts have also observed how the current state of Congress is proving to be beneficial for Modi and consequentially, BJP. There are reasons for that. Whenever Rahul accuses the Modi government of oppressive governance, abuse of power and strangulating journalism in the country, BJP counter attacks with former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi’s move to declare Emergency in 1975. Whenever Rahul Gandhi tried to corner BJP with the alleged Rafale deal corruption, BJP brought to the fore the Bofors scandal which occurred during the tenure of Rajiv Gandhi. And whenever Rahul Gandhi tries to raise his voice over India-China border disputes, BJP points finger at Nehru’s stance over Tibet in 1954. As a result, it becomes easy for the BJP government to digress their failures from the public’s attention. In short, Rahul Gandhi’s digs at Modi and BJP are doing more good than harm to the saffron party. On the other hand, BJP targets and criticises the succession of the Congress party from Jawaharlal Nehru, Indira Gandhi, Rajiv Gandhi, Sonia Gandhi and now Rahul Gandhi.
BJP constantly conjures up Congress’ past which certainly helps them in the elections. Although the party tried to send out a message that there is democracy within the party by electing Mallikarjun Kharge as the party president, the Congress is still largely administered by Rahul Gandhi. The loss in 2014 polls should have been a wake-up call for the Congress, but there have hardly been efforts from the Gandhi family to renew the party in the last nine years. This has led to the senior leaders quitting the party. Rahul Gandhi does not have his young brigade with him anymore either. On the contrary, for the BJP, there is a continuous flow of members from other parties joining it, whether it is out of fear of intelligence agencies or out of love for power.
Not only does the Congress lack a concrete programme to unite their karyakartas, they are also failing to keep the INDIA bloc together. Congress has got into the ‘damage control’ mode only after its leaders have already quit the party. It is important to remember that the party has not been in power in almost 30 years in States such as Tamil Nadu, West Bengal, Uttar Pradesh and Bihar. And the party is also unlikely to return to power in Uttarakhand and Goa. Hence, the Congress needs to start from scratch and work at the ground level. Only then can it hope to have a future.
