After defeat in the Assembly elections, the Congress is in a damage control mission, both in Punjab and Uttar Pradesh, the two states where it was expected to do well but failed. But the irony is that the medicine, the grand old party has chosen for the ailment, may not be able to cure it of the ills plaguing it.
Defence Minister A. K. Antony, battling serious issues related to defence, already has too much on his plate. He has now been forced to head a party committee to look into the causes of defeat in Punjab and solve the public spat between various factional units of state Congress.
Antony may be the “saint” of Indian politics and Congress but I fail to understand how well, if at all, he knows the nuances of Punjab politics and whether he will be able to do anything to make the party fighting fit for the 2014 Lok Sabha elections. Moreover, does he have the time to understand the dynamics of Punjab politics? Neutrality is not going to help here but hard political decisions do matter. Antony is one politician who is not known to take a hard stand in politics. So, constitution of this committee is nothing but just a tactics to “buy time” so that the factional leaders get tired on their own and retreat after spending their energy shouting at each other.
In fact by bringing in Antony to head this committee, Congress has repeated the same mistake which it did by appointing Union Minister C.P. Joshi as the head of the committee to select candidates for the Punjab assembly elections. Hailing from Rajasthan, Joshi hardly knew the developments in Punjab Congress and merely signed on the dotted lines provided to him by the state leaders. This could be one of the contributing factors for the defeat of Congress in Punjab - too much centralization in the cloak of neutrality.
How can you repeat the same mistake again and again? Appointing Joshi as the head of the panel to select Congress candidates was a mistake and so is appointing Antony to another committee for the state to look into the reasons for the defeat. Instead of looking for short term steps, the party should be looking at the larger picture of defeat and take corrective action. Mere firefighting operation is not going to help.
Not long ago, the same Antony was appointed the head of a committee to look into the defeat of Congress in the Assembly elections of Karnataka. For the first time, the BJP had come to power in a state, south of Vindhyas, on its own and an alarmed Congress wanted reasons. Antony gave the reasons and recommended that the candidates should be declared much in advance to give them sufficient time to prepare themselves. This recommendation was never followed in Punjab where the party announced its candidates in the eleventh hour.
The point is even if “Doctor” Antony comes out with a diagnosis of the ailment from which Punjab Congress suffers, will it ever be implemented? Having watched Congress for a while, I am sure it never will. Recommendations, if any, would surely be discussed for a while and then conveniently forgotten.
In Uttar Pradesh too a brainstorming session for fault analysis was done. As expected, it was presided over by Rahul Gandhi who addressed over 200 public meetings in the state and had put to stake whatever reputation he has made till now in politics. But even after the meeting, I am not sure if a roadmap has been drawn to revive the dwindling fortunes of the party and how effective it will be. UP was a classic case of “two cooks spoil the broth”.
In fact, there were several cooks in UP and the broth was sure to be spoilt. There was Digvijay Singh who played the minority card to the hilt but could not get even a fraction of their votes. Then you had Salman Khurshid doing what Digvijay had already done. Sri Prakash Jayaswal and Beni Prasad Verma are the other suspects who presided over the humiliating defeat. At least the party could ask all these leaders to keep their mouth shut for the next five years if not anything else.
But then, in Congress accountability is never fixed. There is a risk in that. There could be somebody raising his finger and saying Rahul Gandhi addressing over 200 meetings failed to deliver the results. Then, you cannot even blame the 22 sitting MPs of the party for failing to secure the victory of the party candidates in their seats. You again have party Chief Sonia Gandhi whose Rae Bareli seat failed to return even a single Congress MLA.
Every Congressperson knows that formation of committees; meetings and brain storming sessions are nothing but an exercise to give opportunity to the aggrieved to vent their anger. After this, Congress functions the way it knows best and where patronage, money and family are the key determinants. Rahul Gandhi himself had diagnosed these three elements. But I am not sure he knows the way out and whether he has done anything to check this except perhaps the botched elections of Youth Congress where too the sons of important leaders get elected.
UP may not have witnessed a turf war amongst the regional leaders as no one gave a serious chance to Congress in the state. But Punjab continues to have a serious verbal duel with Captain Amarinder Singh and his supporters on one side and Rajinder Kaur Bhattal, Ashwini Kumar and a few others on the other side of the divide. It seemed as if two opposition parties were slamming each other day in and day out and not members of the same organisation.
Even if his track record in tackling political issues does not inspire much confidence, Antony will have to thrash out a compromise amongst the warring leaders so that Congress is not reduced to a caricature and becomes a laughing stock in the state. Akali Dal is already looking like huge election winning machinery out to bulldoze all opposition. It would be a travesty of democracy if Congress cannot put its act together and become a responsible opposition party. The party owes it to the people of the state who gave it over 40 per cent of the votes polled. (April 8, 2012)
http://dailypioneer.com/state-editions/chandigarh/55995-viewpoint-.html
No comments:
Post a Comment