Rahul Gandhi and Congress may
term Nitish Kumar's act of dumping the grand alliance government of RJD, JDU
and Congress in Bihar to join the NDA and form a government with the BJP as
betrayal, rank opportunism and treachery, but it may also be an opportunity for
Rahul Gandhi to reinvent himself.
The political opposition in
India has dearth of credible faces to take on the BJP, the NDA and Narendra
Modi at the moment. Nitish Kumar was the strongest of all those contenders who could
have provided a viable face against Narendra Modi in 2019 if the political
opposition could pull an alliance.
Odisha’s chief minister
Naveen Patnaik is another credible face with a clean image who can have
acceptability but he is an outsider for national politics and is content with retaining
his father Biju Patnaik’s citadel. And he has done well to hold on to the
state. But he is certainly not a known Modi-baiter and certainly not a
pan-India face to take on Modi in electoral politics.
The other anti-Modi face with
a non-controversial image in the opposition camp is West Bengal’s chief
minister Mamata Banerjee. But she is also in no position to offer a credible
alternative to take on Modi on a pan-India level in electoral politics, at
least in the context of the 2019 Lok Sabha polls. Also, as the BJP is trying to
emerge as the principle opposition in West Bengal, sidelining the Left Front
and the Congress, she cannot risk neglecting West Bengal for her national
ambitions, at least for now.
We have seen what happened
with the Aam Aadmi Party and Arvind Kejriwal. They tried to fan out too early
after winning the people’s mandate in Delhi. Result! AAP created a sort of
record with its candidates forfeiting their deposits in the 2014 Lok Sabha polls.
The humiliation outside Delhi continued in the recently concluded Punjab
assembly polls. Like West Bengal is for Mamata Banarjee, Delhi is for Arvind
Kejriwal. They cannot risk leaving the states before proving their mettle. And
certainly it is not the time.
Remember, even Modi had spent
almost 13 years as Gujarat chief minister, consolidating his position, before
fanning out of Gujarat. The time was opportune for him in 2014 when the country
was looking for an alternative political face and he could make the public
believe, based on his credentials of serving Gujarat four times that he was
indeed the one who could be the answer to the huge anti-incumbency of ten years
of the Congress rule under the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government led
by Manmohan Singh.
The health of any nation’s
democracy needs at least two credible political faces who can compete
nationally. The more the merrier. The political opposition space in India is
looking for someone who can take on Narendra Modi for the upcoming 2019 Lok
Sabha polls and Nitish Kumar was the most probable contender.
But as Nitish Kumar has been
effectively co-opted by the BJP again, that option is gone, and along with it
the 2019 Lok Sabha polls. Now only a miracle can save the day for them as hardly
a year is left before going full throttle on the campaign spree for the next
parliamentary election and we know miracles don’t happen in politics. Every
step is a calculated move in this game of possibilities where there are no
permanent friends or foes and Nitish Kumar has again showed us this.
Now the political opposition
needs to look beyond 2019 to take on Narendra Modi and the BJP. And most
importantly a face who can stand against Narendra Modi in elections beyond
2019. The BJP, in fact, has become the only national political party with its
governments in every corner of the country. With Bihar again in its kitty, the
BJP and its allies have now governments in 18 Indian states while Congress is
at a historic low and is seeing further decline. And the central reason behind
this is the perceived absence of leadership in the party.
CAN RAHUL GANDHI REINVENT
HIMSELF?
Though Sonia Gandhi is still
the Congress’ president, its Rahul Gandhi, the vice-president, who is the de
facto head of the party. But willingly or unwillingly, an image of being a
reluctant and non-serious politician has overtaken his political identity. Add
to it the spate of electoral losses in states and the huge setback in the 2014
Lok Sabha elections and we come across a perception that Rahul Gandhi is
neither inclined nor able to shoulder the responsibility.
That he needs to break. He
needs to reinvent himself because he has the means to emerge as the pan-India
alternative of Narendra Modi.
To represent India in
national politics, one either needs a long and influential political career, be
it at state level like Narendra Modi has had or at national level like PV
Narasimha Rao had or it has to be a dynastic lineage of a political party with
a pan-India presence.
The Nehru-Gandhi family has
had this advantage, be it Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi earlier and Sonia
Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi now. It is true that Indira Gandhi did build her
political career for many years, including participating in the Indian freedom
struggle, but she was a union minister for just two years before she became
prime minister in 1966. Rajiv Gandhi was also a sort of reluctant politician
before he was made prime minister after Indira Gandhi's assassination. But once
in the office, he did try to evolve. Sonia Gandhi was accepted because she
belonged to the family and same holds true for Rahul as well.
Though the Congress has
shrunk to just five states and one union territory with only two electorally
significant states, i.e., Karnataka and Punjab, in fold and could win just 44
Lok Sabha seats in the 2014 General Elections, it is still the only other
national political party than the BJP with a pan-India presence with 19 per
cent vote share in the 2014 elections. The party is still the principle
opposition in many states including Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan,
Gujarat, Telangana, Odisha, Haryana, Uttarakhand and Goa. That is still a great
leverage over other anti-BJP political parties.
And as the big three, Nitish
Kumar, Mamata Banerjee and Naveen Patnaik, are effectively ruled out as the
anti-BJP face of the political opposition, who could have mobilized the whole
anti-BJP opposition to form a credible alternative this is an opportunity for
Rahul to chip in and claim the place that he enjoys with his Nehru-Gandhi lineage.
What also helps his prospects is the fact that other non-Congress regional
satraps like Mayawati, Akhilesh Yadav, K Chandrasekhar Rao and MK Stalin are
limited to their states only with no electoral appeal outside.
Rahul began his active
political career around 2008 and since the very beginning he has been the most
important voice in the Congress, even if Manmohan Singh was the prime minister
and he has worked hard and has campaigned hard in every part of the country in
every election. True the Congress is looking like a crumbling bloc these days
but Rahul's failures so far tell us he may be lacking in focus in leading the
party out of the mess. The opposition in India is in disarray. Its politics
looks flabbergasted. It needs someone who can give it some direction. Can Rahul
Gandhi realize the opportunity at hand?
©SantoshChaubey
