A
sweeper sweeps the ground as defeated BJP leaders look on
Rahul,
Priyanka Gave Fresh Air to Congress
By
Saeed Naqvi
NEW
DELHI: Anyone who saw Rahul Gandhi in Varanasi during the campaign
knew something qualitatively different from anything witnessed
in recent elections had been unleashed. It was not a turnout for
a tamasha but a surging mass relieved at the sight of freshness
in the midst of putrid politics. 
Of
course, the Priyanka/Rahul factor during the campaign is not reflected
in the UP results. But the scale on which their limited electioneering
was amplified by the electronic media had an impact across the
length and breadth of the country. If the Congress president had
fielded them even six months ago, Congress revival would have
been much more substantial.
Congress
leaders, somewhat retiring and diffident in recent times, particularly
after the defeats in Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh,
had suddenly come alive in the wake of opinion and exit polls.
After the tidal wave swept aside Chandrababu Naidu’s much
hyped government, Congress leaders at 24 Akbar Road were busy
computing their own estimates of the seats the party would win
on its own. It must be recorded for posterity that Ambika Soni’s
figure was closest to the actual tally.
The
Congress victory must not be exaggerated. The party had dipped
to 140 seats under P.V. Narasimha Rao’s leadership. Sitaram
Kesri in 1998 pulled it up to 141. Then came Sonia Gandhi’s
first debacle — under her presidentship the party plummeted
to its lowest ever figure, 114 seats. Much of the party’s
history since has consisted in vacillating between coalition and
isolation.
Sonia’s
first impulse to go it alone manifested itself during the party’s
Panchmarhi conclave in September 1998. She decided against coalitions
because they were not required in Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and
Delhi, going to the polls in November 1998. In these states it
was a straight BJP-Congress contest. Her decision made ample sense.
Alas, this specific experience was mistaken for a winning strategy
in the rest of the country.
By
trial and error, she finally decided to knit clever alliances
in Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra and Bihar. It is just
as well that her quest for alliances in UP did not work out. In
UP the Congress has disintegrated into its constituent caste groups
— Yadavs, Rajputs and Muslims under Mulayam Singh’s
sway and Dalits and Muslims under Mayawati’s spell. Had
the Congress allied itself to either party, its revival in UP
would have been indefinitely forestalled. And UP has 80 Lok Sabha
seats.
The
emergence of Priyanka and Rahul in a country where more than half
the population is under 30 years has introduced a new charismatic
element in electoral politics.
In this framework the next round of elections could well bring
the Congress back as the national party the country is searching
for.
It
is just as well that the BJP has made headway in Karnataka and
Kerala (in a very tiny way). This has the potential of stabilizing
the BJP as another national party with national responsibilities
— the direction in which Atal Bihari Vajpayee was leading
the party. The voter has told the BJP the kind of party it will
not tolerate — the extremist outfit run by Narendra Modi.
Those in the BJP already sniping at Vajpayee must deeply ponder
the Gujarat verdict.
It
is my belief that the BJP would have fared better had Modi-like
influences not distorted Vajpayee’s social agenda. The fact
that he went against his instincts and made tactical adjustments
with the hardliners on Modi at Goa hurt the party. A clear Vajpayee
line was distorted.
The
problem with a cliche is that it sometimes embodies eternal truths.
But because it is a cliche we sometimes throw the baby out with
the bath water. The level to which Vajpayee has navigated Indo-Pak
relations is not something to be sniffed at. Rahul and Priyanka
themselves during the Karachi cricket match witnessed the extraordinary
warmth in relations between the people of both countries. They
know these relations would have remained mired in the past had
Vajpayee not taken all the bold decisions healthy bilateral relations
required. To achieve this he had to fight the Modi tendency within
the BJP.
Vajpayee
could legitimately have a set of complaints against the party.
To go for early elections was not his idea. In fact he was constantly
citing the occasional inverse equation between assembly and Lok
Sabha results. Shining India was also not his brainchild. Selling
middle class consumerist dreams to a rural India groaning under
unspeakable poverty and worse has recoiled on those who designed
the campaign. The Congress counter attack on rising unemployment
found an echo with the younger electorate.
A
happy addition to national politics is the growth of the Left
— gains in Kerala, West Bengal and Andhra Pradesh. The Indian
establishment’s knee-jerk anti-Leftism is misplaced as the
doctrinaire Left is a thing of the past. Visit China or Vietnam
and you’ll be astonished at the practical adjustments Communist
parties have made with contemporary economic realities.
Indeed,
one lesson of the electoral verdict is that Shining India must
be matched by distributive justice, an area in which the Left
must not be faulted simply by the apolitical, burgeoning middle
class which is out of touch with social realities.
There
is occasionally a tendency for a new government to appear to be
making departures in all spheres. This can sometimes lead to disaster.
The late T.N. Kaul virtually imposed on Indira Gandhi an endorsement
of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. This faulty decision was
not at all essential for our excellent relations with Moscow in
a myriad other ways. The new government also inherits excellent
relations with China, the US, Iran, Europe, the Gulf. Plus, a
sound economic base.
Sonia
must be warned on one count. Her assumption of prime ministership
will immediately give a handle to the Modis and their ilk to embark
on the “second liberation of India”. This is for her
party to ponder. Who knows, embedded in these results may well
be the people’s verdict on her foreign origin. Jayalalithaa
had made the foreign origin issue the solitary point of her campaign.
She has been swept away.
The
electorate has in these elections given us a sort of tripod —
a Congress with its allies expanding their middle ground, a BJP
slowly discarding its defeated Gujarat line and a new Left chiseling
away its debilitating dogma. Federal India, in the form of regional
parties, proceeds alongside — and the Mulayam Singh/Amar
Singh duet emerges all wreathed in smiles. - Indian Express
