In the concluding speech of former Congress President Rahul Gandhi’s Nav Sankalp Shivir in Udaipur, about 99 percent of the things he said for the last eight years were said. BJP divides society, while Congress unites and BJP works for a few industrialists, while Congress works for all, was the theme of his speech. They have been doing these things for years. He has said this many times, ‘I am not afraid of anyone and I have not taken a single rupee from anyone’. He admitted that the Congress has lost its connection with the public, this is also not a new thing. If he accepts the responsibility of defeat in front of the media or by tweeting after the defeat of Congress in every election, then he actually accepts that the connection of Congress with the public is broken.
Overall, there was a new line in his nearly 35-minute speech that regional parties cannot defeat the BJP as they have no ideology. They have been saying earlier also that only Congress can fight with BJP. But this time he raised the issue of regional parties and their ideology.
This statement of Rahul Gandhi is not only politically incorrect, but also factually incorrect and misleading. The reality of the present times is that barring a few exceptions, the Congress is not fighting the BJP alone anywhere. She herself is dependent on regional parties in many states and is fighting with the help of their strength. On the other hand regional parties can and are fighting with BJP on their own. Congress party is not able to fight with BJP because it has neither organizational strength nor ideological strength. The ideological clarity of the Congress was not visible even in the three-day Nav Sankalp Shivir.
The party described BJP’s politics as divisive but the attack on it was not outright. The Congress did not say that the BJP is using the politics of Hindutva. The party did not even say what politics it would do against this politics of Hindutva. It was not clear what alternative view he had. Like BJP, Congress is also following the path of Hindutva or soft Hindutva. Will this be his path, it was not clarified. So, the ideological ambiguity is more in the Congress than in any regional party. This is the reason why there is no break-up in regional parties, whereas leaders of the Congress party change parties in as much time as it takes in the blink of an eye. This is the culmination of the ideological collapse of the Congress, with such a large number of its leaders leaving the party.
Now there is no need for any great intellectual exercise to understand the reality of winning and losing. In the last eight years, regional parties have stopped the BJP’s victory chariot from place to place. The BJP is finding it difficult to fight only regional or non-Congress parties. Rahul Gandhi keeps on saying everywhere without meaning that he is courageous and is not afraid of the BJP. Without saying this, the regional satraps of many states are fighting the BJP. They are not flaunting their courage. They are also facing the wrath of central agencies. Despite this, fighting the BJP and even defeating it. If we calculate the win-win ratio between him and the Congress, the picture will automatically become clear. BJP leaders also believe that it is very easy for them to fight and defeat the Congress. BJP is repeatedly defeating Congress and its leaders publicly say that their real campaigner is Rahul Gandhi. They do not say this about regional leaders. It is possible that given the Congress’s pan-India presence and past history, the BJP is afraid of the prospect of its return and therefore targets Rahul more, but the fact is that so far in the last eight years, Rahul and the Congress under his command have defeated the BJP. Not given a real challenge.
The real challenge for the BJP is the regional parties. In Bihar in 2015, when RJD and JDU got together, both defeated the BJP badly. Mamta Banerjee even defeated in West Bengal twice in a row in 2016 and 2021. Similarly Arvind Kejriwal badly defeated BJP in two consecutive elections in Delhi. Hemant Soren defeated BJP decisively in Jharkhand. The Congress was also an alliance partner in Bihar and Jharkhand, which benefited it. In Tamil Nadu, the DMK thwarted the BJP’s fighting strategy by forming an alliance with the Anna DMK. In Kerala, the Left Front has stopped the BJP, while in Odisha and Andhra Pradesh, two regional parties have stopped the BJP’s victory chariot. If BJP has to be stopped in Telangana too, Congress will not do this work, but TRS will do it. In Maharashtra, BJP’s old ally Shiv Sena took the initiative and prevented BJP from forming the government.
If we look at the performance of the Congress against this performance of the regional parties, then the picture becomes very clear. Wherever there was a direct contest for the Congress or the onus was on the Congress to stop the BJP, it almost completely failed. The entire Northeast has not gone under the control of the BJP because of any regional party, but it was the failure of the Congress to form governments in half a dozen states with or supporting the BJP. In Karnataka, the joint government of Congress and JDS did not fall because of the break-up of JDS, but because of the weakness of the Congress and its breakdown, the government fell. In Madhya Pradesh, people had given victory to the Congress, but due to the weakness of the Congress, the government there also fell. Congress is in government in only two states at present and that too not because of any ideology or central leadership of the party, but because of two strong regional satraps of the party. Even in the Lok Sabha elections, where the BJP is competing with the Congress, its result is close to 100 percent. Barring two-three states, in most of the states, even in the Lok Sabha elections, the regional satraps have challenged and stopped the BJP.
The Congress is ignoring the fact that most of the regional parties have a long political history and have emerged from one movement or the other. Jharkhand Mukti Morcha was born out of the movement for a separate Jharkhand state and RJD, SP etc. emerged from Mandal politics. The DMK is the birthplace of the long Dravidian movement, while the Telangana Rashtra Samithi emerged from the separate state movement. Trinamool Congress has been formed against the Left rule of three and a half decades. These parties have their own history, their ideology, agenda to work for their people and above all they have organization and cadre strength. Against them, Congress is left with nothing but history.
