After Lok Sabha debacle, Congress is facing a tough time to survive. Even questions are being raised on the grand old party’s existence. The party president Rahul Gandhi toiled hard across the country, but the script of his poll campaign had no clear end goal. Rahul kept targeting Prime Minister Narendra Modi, addressing him as ‘Chowkidar Chor Hai’ without pitting himself as an alternative.
The charges against Modi on Rafale lacked punch or demonstrative evidence. Worse was his inability to wriggle out of legal wrangling where he had himself drawn the wrath of the Supreme Court for ludicrously attributing the ‘Chowkidar Chor Hai’ remark to the apex court.
But, after the poll debacle, Rahul Gandhi conceded in front of media and later offered resignation as party chief. To quote BJP president Amit Shah, “Congress got zero seats in 17 states and Union territories while BJP secured over 50 percent votes in as many states and UTs”. This is how huge the gap between the two parties is. Irrespective of whether Rahul Gandhi remains at the helm or not, the party has an enormous task ahead of it if it has to put up even a semblance of a challenge in front of the BJP in the years to come.
Confusion, which does not seem to resolve
Even as the proceedings of the 17th Lok Sabha began on Monday, the Congress is yet to name its floor leader in the House, underlining the confusion within India’s grand old party as it approaches new innings on the Opposition benches.
It’s just not Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha, even on Monday there was speculation about whether Congress president Rahul Gandhi, who lost from his stronghold Amethi but was elected from Wayanad in Kerala, would take oath on the first day of the session. So is Congress really marred by confusion or has the grand old party lost hopes of reviving itself?
Cannot face defeat
The confusion on oath taking of Rahul Gandhi was sorted out on Monday itself. Congress President Rahul Gandhi took oath as the MP from Wayanad in the afternoon when neither Prime Minister Modi nor Home Minister Shah were in the House.
He had arrived in the morning but chose to skip the forenoon session, ostensibly because he could not stomach the ruling MPs lustily cheering Prime Minister Modi. He turned up only in the afternoon and sat next to his mother Sonia Gandhi; he returned to the seat immediately after taking the oath in English.
Rahul chose not to even look at the government benches, nor did he greet Defence Minister Rajnath Singh who was present in the House, as most MPs did after taking the oath. In fact, he was in a tearing hurry to rush back to his seat after the oath and had to be called back, as he had not signed the register as a newly elected MP. He signed the register, greeted Brijbhushan Sharan Singh and returned to his turf.
Fundamental flaws, no strategy in place
After a humiliating defeat in Lok Sabha, Congress has no strategy in place. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) has witnessed a landslide victory and has performed even better than in 2014. The Congress-led campaign in this election was very different. The party tried hard to bring the issue of corruption (Rafale) with a direct attack on the Prime Minister, along with the issues of farmers’ unrest, unemployment among youth, inflation, demonetization and goods and services tax (GST). Congress also came out with a proposal of the NYAY scheme to lure the marginalised section of the society. However, the corruption issue could not influence the electorate in any way and the idea of NYAY could not reach the potential group of electorate, despite a very hard-fought and vigorously canvassed election campaign by Rahul Gandhi.
The biggest weakness of the Congress has been poor organisational structure, minimal resources, and diminishing vibrant leadership at the state level, among other issues. Reports are also saying that Congress’ humiliating defeat in the recently concluded Lok Sabha elections were a cumulative effect of bad data collection by its analytics team, an Economics Times has suggested. According to the report, the Grand Old Party failed to establish an accurate ear-to-ground sense, courtesy Project Shakti – Congress’ data analytics team – not being able to correctly gauge the Modi 2.0 wave.
No face for Congress
The Indian National Congress during the post-independence period and during Mahatma Gandhi period dominated the political arena. But in 2014, then came Narendra Modi, helping sweep the opposition to a resounding victory in 2014. Congress, with just 8 percent of the seats in Parliament, was crushed.
Five years and much soul-searching later, indications from the latest parliamentary elections suggest that India’s once-dominant powerhouse will have to lower its ambitions of returning to its old glory anytime soon.
But, the Congress does not face an existential crisis as many have suggested; it is facing a leadership crisis. Congress President Rahul Gandhi has said that the party will have to find a new chief as he will not change his mind about stepping down from the post of the party chief. Rahul Gandhi, who informed Congress about his decision to quit following the Lok Sabha election results, has refused to meet the party's newly-elected lawmakers.
Reports said that Rahul Gandhi has not changed his mind, despite several Congress leaders asking him to remain at the post of the Congress chief. Officially, the party told reporters that Rahul Gandhi's resignation offer had been unanimously rejected.
Congress asked the media to respect the sanctity of the closed-door meeting of its working committee and not fall into the trap of speculations and wait for the efforts by the Congress party towards a future course of action. Rahul Gandhi has reportedly made it clear to the party that he would not vanish and would continue to work for Congress.
Rahu Gandhi had also said it is not necessary that the president should be from Gandhi family. When Priyanka Gandhi's name came up as an alternative, Rahul Gandhi reportedly said, "Don't drag my sister into it."
So if not Priyanka Gandhi, so who else? There not many names left that can be grand old party's chief. Senior leaders like Mallikarjun Kharge and Ahmed Patel can be the faces, but these are just mere speculation, the final decision will only be taken by the party high command.
Lacking future plans
While Congress is currently facing a leadership crisis, it is also lacking future plans to tackle the Modi government 2.0. After conceding defeat in Lok Sabha elections, Mr Gandhi addressed a press conference in Delhi where he conceded the election to Mr Modi, saying the people had given their mandate and chosen the BJP. He also took full responsibility for the Congress party's defeat.
Refusing to give further details about the Congress performance or what would come next, Mr Gandhi said it would all be discussed in the meeting of the Congress Working Committee, the party's top decision-making body. He also told the Congress workers, the ones who lost and the ones who won, not to lose hope. "There is no need to be afraid. We will continue to work hard and we will eventually win."
But since then, nobody from Congress has come out to talk about the Lok Sabha election debacle or discussed its future plans. Now, while BJP has a strong cabinet and is feeling invincible, Congress is still introspecting the loss.
