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INDIAN POLITICAL SCENE

Congress Attempting a Comeback

by Brig (Rtd) M Abdul Hafiz
***Congress' ranks including Sitaram Kesri, the party supremo hardly hid their craving for power which they tasted for many years. The desire even if veiled one surfaced at least once when Congress withdrew its support from Deve Gowda government without a convincing reason.***
INDIAN Congress party with its glorious heritage of spearheading India's freedom movement and leading the country for 45 years during its post-independence period now lies in tatter. Not only the party suffered its worst defeat in 1996 general TseCOftn. an unexpected spate of Sx fatally struck the outfit th before and after the eleventh Lokshava poll. Tainted by Bofors scandal, among others. Congress was defeated also in 1989 and became internally divided after the assassination of Rajiv Gandhi In 1991 PV Karashima Rao formed a minority government at the Centre but could not maintain the cohesion of the party. In may 1995 the party finally split with a break away congress led by ND Tiwari, an old party vet erah. Only months before 1996 election 'hawala' transaction charges were leveled against three Congress ministers and the net quickly widened to include a number of other former Congress ministers irre-pairably denting the party's electoral prospects.
No sooner the election was over, it was the turn of outgoing prime minister Rao who. it was widely believed, masterminded the nawala' plot to undermine his political opponents both within and outside the Congress. Rao and a host of other prominent Congress leaders were now Implicated by CBI (central bureau of investigation) in infamous JMM (Jharkhand Mukti Morcha) case. Within a month Rao faced another charge of having accepted 8100 70 00 bribe from Lekhu Bhal Pathak, a British Indian to secure the latter government contract. Another Congress minister Sukhram was Implicated in yet another scandal. Rao was entangled also in St Kitts bribery case In which he was believed to have forged certain documents. Faced with this cascade of ignominy an exasperated, Rao stepped down late last year from the premiership of an already-tainted Congress by handing Its rein over to a lackluster octogcrian. Sitaram Kesri.
The ignomlmous fall from an exalted height of the mono-
Hth which charted the course of India'a political history (or wq a centurydid not. however., Woke much MQrpri»ebeaua the decay and the deefirtetifthe party had since begun. Most literatures on the Congress trace the party's decline from late-'60a when its suffered its first split in 1969. However It was the 80s that witnessed the breakdown of Congress system both at the Centre and in the states. The party machinery experienced decay due to twin forces of centralisation and de-Institutionallsation which operated during the mld-'7oa emergency period. Under Indira Gandhi, there had been gradual erosion of intra-party democracy. increasing use of centralised institutional devices and interference in the working of the state governments leading to the loss of autonomy and even atrophy of party organisations. The party was further weakened during the prime ministership of Rajiv Gandhi who failed to reverse the trend with his preference for a managerial work culture.
Notwithstanding, a partial recovery of the party during 1980 and 1984 elections restoring Its traditional bastion of Nehruvian era, the six northern states In the Hindi heartland it could never restore its structure of dominance shattered in its 1977 defeat. Strangely, the party again suffered defeat In 1989, the worst in the north. It did poorly also In the east but well in the south. The southern performance remained intact also in 1991 making Congress a party with a base mainly in the south now.
in 1996 election. Congress performed badly both in the north and south. The party became marginalised holding very few seats in Uttar Pradesh. Bihar, Madhya Pradesh,. Karnataka and Maharastrya which earlier formed its bastion. These sets back apart the demoralisation that had set in the party ranks as a result of leadership crisis particularly during Rao's rule was more respon-
sible for sapping the strength of Corwress At least. i^U^fag 'enact his rule Rao sh^HMRsi blr vans of an IntellecWSl la •fguejand political naivity Avnich proved infections and damaging during the election.
Given this dismal state of things for the Congress and its numerous predicaments, what are the chances of the party returning to power? The Congress' ranks including Sitaram Kesri, the party supremo-hardly hid their craving for power which they tasted for many years. The desire even If veiled one surfaced at least once when Congress withdrew its support from Deve Gowda government without a convincing reason.
The personal ambition of some In the erstwhile ruling party must have been at work behind the move. Indira Gandhi who reorganised Congress in the late- 60s and gave it its present shape and orientation was an ardent practitioner of real politick and had penchant for either wresting absolute power or courting total defeat in political gambles she often took. The Sillvlty seems to be persist-among the Congress ranks ough they lack the skill of
Ms Gandhi who rose like a phoenix from the ashes of 1977 defeat. Can today’s Congress repeat her performance? It believes, it can. The notion was reinforced when in recently held Calcutta plenary the party reaffirmed "its faith in its capacity to ensure and acquire Eubhc support for a viable, stale, one party government" of
the Congress.
True, the Congress is in many ways unique. Not only it has the craving for power, it is the only party with a national
spread, a common thread of as-running through the
Jmmtry's diverse thoughts and 'feats.-the organisations St th^ ,grassroots and a treasure of ex-jPrteHee of how » nftr a coati- ■ nental polity. In contrast, the BJP is at the best, a sectarian party promoting the interests of India’s burgeoning Hindu middle-class which wants to combine its religious prejudices with new found affluence. The front, in spite of ruling India more than once under variety of arrangements falls however to emerge as a strong national alternative.
Yet the Congress assertion at the 80th, party plenary which was its first attempt to
revive and revamp the organisation after 1996 debacle was preposterious and not in any way substantiated by ground realities. Most political observers find the plenary an exercise in completing Mr Kesri's consolidation and its vindication lies in providing a ’feel good' therapy to the disillusioned lot of congressmen. If nothing else they dispersed from Calcutta believing that their party could again stage a comeback at the Centre. After Calcutta Jamboree. the Congress can claim that it has once again discovered a belief in its destiny if not capacity — to preside over the country. To an extent, there was recovery of the party's collective elan. In a small measure there was also an inner party consolidation. Beyond this, the party's standing remained as precarious as it was before.
Even if the party was consolidated during its plenary session there was no immediate indication of the consolidation
of party's hold over the electorate. In spite of fanfare, high drama and self-exhortations in
- Calcutta plenary, the Congress failed to formulate a coherent response to the deeper, crises of the country its political system and party organisations; neither could It offer any radically new or innovative prescriptions for the problems facing the country. Nothing that Congress said or did in Calcutta was suggestive of the party having any clue to how to make a stable governance of India a working proposition once again. Tne party's political resolution did recognise the loss of the confidence of the minorities and deprived classes who formed major vote banks for the Congress, but later drifted away from the party. There was no strategy outlined how would they be won back. An impressive array of 117 speakers took part in debate over the party's political resolutions but none came out with a dazzling perspective or any original idea of statecraft. In political term, in spite of the eloquence and ornaments. the speeches were reduced to mere platitudes. A-though at the outset of the plenary Congress wanted to apologies for 1992 Ayodhya episode to win back the Muslims. finally it fumbled out. only a perfunctory regret. No credible steps were taken to recover the lost ground also with regard to scheduled castes and tribes. It was a disappointment for those who needed more than bracing word to heal their sense of being wronged.
On organisational front the bunglings are still more acute. The party's organisational conditions being what it is today the Congress cannot hope for reaching even the fringes of power unless it is drastically overhauled. In the states its units are riven by factions and controlled either by power brokers or regional satraps seeking to use party machinery for personal ambitions. Amidst this disconcerting situation the steps to give the party a cogency
and coherent shape is yet to be undertaken. There is no conscious effort as yet to resolve the seisms that exist in the state units of the party. Not only Mamta Banerjee continues to be a thorn in Congress' flesh In West BengAaucn mavericks are there alsoj^har, Punjab and Andhra Prflnsh.
The lasAjut not the least is the Congrels acute identity crisis during a crucial transformation period. The party had been gradually reformulating its ideology on the twin contentions issues of economic development and secularism. Indira Gandhi made a clear shift towards the right on both social and economic issues when she resumed power in 1980. Rajiv Gandhi representing a new post-nationalist generation In the Congress with little attachment to Nehruvtan ideals carried the process further. The Rao regime faced by acute social conflicts and a major economic crisis retreated from the two basic pillars of Nehru model, socialism and secularism and created a crisis of identity and Ideology within the party that contributed to Its breakdown. Both the transition and its trauma do not seem to be over.
The Ayodhya problem, the reservation for the OBCs (other backward castes), the need for macro-economic stabilisation versus the need for welfare schemes for the poor and myriad other contradictions led to the poor performance of the party in the state assembly elections after 1993. By the mid-■90s. the Congress party lost its broad social, regional and ideological appeal among its rank and file. By no means, the Congress can take a fresh electoral plunge before these organisational issues and problems are resolved with due earnestness. Then its equation with the people also will have to be re-established. None more than Congress is aware of the daunting tasks ahead and the stake Involved. This explains why the Congress has been just marking time although it can set In motion a chain of events making inevitable a mid-term poll at any time. The time is not ripe for CongreM as yet to call the shut