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What Mahatma Gandhi would've advised Rahul on his 47th birthday

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Minhaz Merchant
Minhaz MerchantJun 15, 2017 | 15:08

What Mahatma Gandhi would've advised Rahul on his 47th birthday

Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi turns 47 next Monday (June 19) in Italy where he is on holiday. Father Rajiv Gandhi, after being prime minister for five years and Opposition leader for 18 months, was tragically assassinated, three months before he turned 47, in Sriperumbudur, near Chennai.

Rahul has had a slower ascent to power. The route though has been similar: dynasty.

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Rajiv became prime minister because younger brother Sanjay died at 34 in June 1980 and mother Indira Gandhi in October 1984. Rajiv, rather than Manmohan Singh, was the first accidental prime minister.

Fiefdom

Sonia Gandhi has acted as caretaker to the family’s political fiefdom ever since that tragic May day in 1991. But now it is finally time to pass on the baton. Rahul is likely to be anointed (note: not appointed) president of the Indian National Congress in October. Those who initially gave Rahul the benefit of the doubt as an essentially decent man trapped in the wrong profession have changed their minds.

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His refusal to expel Sandeep Dikshit form the Congress for calling Army chief General Bipin Rawat a “street thug” makes him complicit in the outrage. Rahul’s evolution as a leader has stalled since the Congress’ decimation in the 2014 Lok Sabha election. His cynical reaction to the September 29, 2016 surgical strike on Pakistani terror launch pads was especially disappointing.

Father Rajiv, for all his faults, protected the national interest. It is difficult to see Rahul doing that. Since his dynastic political debut in Amethi in 2004, Rahul has been a reluctant leader. In 13 years he has contributed little to parliamentary debate, asked few questions, dozed periodically and remained incognito during key debates.

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Since the party’s crushing defeat in the Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections, however, Rahul has shifted gear. He knows that defeat for the Congress in the 2019 Lok Sabha election is likely. It is 2024 that he is banking on. The thinking in the Congress too is that Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s charisma will sweep the BJP-led NDA back to power in 2019. But by 2024, antiincumbency could set in.

Modi in mid-2024 will be approaching 74. Rahul will be only 54. He would have completed 20 years in Parliament: 2024, therefore, could be his moment. If real changes — economic and social — have not set in by then, disillusionment with the BJP is a real possibility. Competing Opposition leaders may also have run out of steam.

Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar would be in his mid-70s. Arvind Kejriwal might well lose the Delhi Assembly elections in 2020 and sink into political oblivion. The others, including Mamata Banerjee, are regional leaders with limited national appeal. The Congress strategy is, therefore, to prepare Rahul for a marathon while continuing to chip away at Modi’s credibility.

The ploy began with the “suit boot ki sarkar” jibe. Modi responded with demonetisation — in one stroke morphing himself from an industrialist-friendly PM to a man of the masses. His wardrobe, body language and rhetoric underwent a smooth transformation. In part at least, that helped the BJP sweep UP, Delhi’s municipalities and a slew of other smaller polls.

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Violence

The Congress “hand” in the Mandsaur violence in Madhya Pradesh is central to the party’s strategy to erode Modi’s pro-poor image which has helped the BJP win election after election. What better way to damage the BJP than by instigating farmers against one of the party’s longest-serving chief ministers, Shivraj Singh Chouhan, who will face a tough Assembly election in 2018?

To underscore that bad habits die hard, Congress’ national spokesperson Randeep Surjewala, when confronted by the video of party MLA Shakuntala Khatik, booked earlier this week for inciting her party workers to set police stations on fire, ignored that criminal act but instead focused on Khatik’s Dalit identity.

With Sonia increasingly in poor health, the future of the Congress rests with Rahul and Priyanka who will assume Sonia’s role as back-end support. Robert Vadra though looms ominously in the background. Is this the kind of Congress India will vote for in 2024? Will young leaders like Sachin Pilot and Jyotiraditya Scindia (both dynasts as well) remain subalterns even in their 50s?

In a rapidly modernising India, is such a feudal family set-up likely to resonate with millennial voters?

Dynasty

The answer clearly is no. For the Congress to have any chance to serve as an effective Opposition — much less win office — it must abandon dynasty. Let leaders rise from within to rejuvenate the party. India needs a credible left-of-centre party that is professionally run.

Eventually, India will have two poles — the BJP on the centre-right and another party to occupy the Congress’ centre-left vacuum. Mahatma Gandhi wanted the Congress to be dissolved after Independence because he knew dynasty could impoverish the party. Instead dynasty has impoverished India but done rather well for itself.

Were the Mahatma alive, the first piece of advice he would have offered Rahul on his 47th birthday next Monday would be to find another job — one that he enjoys and is good at.

Meanwhile, the BJP needs to up its game. Don’t take electoral victories for granted. Rein in fringe groups. Introduce more talent at every level. Communicate better. Focus on governance. Appoint a Lokpal.

In the long run, good economic governance and institution building will win elections more effectively than votebanks of farmers and the poor.

(Courtesy: Mail Today)

Last updated: June 16, 2017 | 15:51
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