How a battered Congress still remains a fiercely potent opposition

At the height of the Cold War, the Russians had developed a nuclear deterrence system called Perimeter, more ominously known as the "Dead Hand".

“It was a weapon of last resort. It was created to ensure that even if the Soviet leadership was wiped out, a nuclear response could still be launched against the West and NATO in retaliation,” Business Insider reported in 2014. It checked “if there's anyone alive and in charge of the Soviet military…if they’re not alive, it takes over”.

The Congress’ hand is severely bruised but far from dead. And in the first 18 months of the Narendra Modi government, it has shown how just how potent it can be with just 44 MPs in Lok Sabha and reduced to rubble in most states.

It has also proved that like the Soviet Dead Hand, it has created over seven decades an ecosystem formidable enough to fire back even when its masters are down and out.

Decimated in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, the Congress has harnessed the fear of BJP’s rising brute power among other parties. Indian polity today is essentially "BJP vs the Rest", the Rest led in quiet ways by the Congress both in Parliament and outside.

The Congress has played on that precise fear to keep the BJP from winning friends in Rajya Sabha. It has stalled every major reform, from the Land Bill to GST, which had to go through the House.

And while electorally the Congress could do little to stop the BJP from winning state after state — except unwittingly in Delhi, where the Aam Aadmi Party swept to power with the entire Congress vote shifting to it — it has punched way above its current weight to frustrate Modi sarkar, built perceptions against it.

The most remarkable success of the Congress has been what it has done by not being seen doing much.

A narrative of intolerance has wrapped itself around the nation like a boa. Author, filmmakers and activists are returning their awards almost every other day to protest what they feel is an extremely vicious communal atmosphere. What is surprising is that few have produced statistical proof that communal violence across the country is actually on the rise.

“There were 668, 823, and 644 incidents of communal violence nationwide in the years 2012, 2013, and 2014 respectively [figures produced in Parliament], the last three full years for which we have data,” wrote economist and columnist Rupa Subramanya in a Newslaundry piece titled, "Think India has become more communal under Modi? The numbers will disappoint you".

But there lies the success of the Congress’ decades of carefully nurtured ecosystem of patronage. It has got activated like the Soviet Dead Hand, without even a signal from the High Command. Intellectuals who received and dutifully dusted their honours through Emergency, 1983 Nellie massacre, 1984 anti-Sikh riots, overturning of Shah Bano verdict, fall of Babri Masjid, and Mumbai, Gujarat, Assam and Muzaffarnagar riots among other events have now spotted the worst of times.

Not every person protesting or returning the honour has enjoyed Congress patronage. But so powerful is the narrative of intolerance, it has convinced them of the moral imperative to make their voices count.

It has made a global rating agency of Moody’s stature to urge the Modi government against “belligerent provocation of various Indian minorities”.

The Congress must be smiling. From the debris of electoral devastation, it has fired more deadly and effective ammunition than what a better-placed BJP could from the opposition benches between 2004 and 2014.

When it comes to building one’s own ecosystem, the BJP is still filling up nursery forms in the school of which the Congress is the principal.