Rahul’s risen, now he needs to shine

Congress scion Rahul Gandhi has announced his party’s leadership transition with a bang. His dramatic intervention to scuttle the ordinance nullifying the Supreme Court order on convicted politicians in public life demonstrates his desire to dictate the future course of his party. Critics may question the timing and the language of his intervention. That, however, does not detract from the primary political aim of Mr Gandhi — to show that he is taking charge. The leadership transition in the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has been rammed through by its parent organisation, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh. In the process it crushed the egos and ambitions of old and young leaders alike. Had it not done so — irrespective of whether the right person has been chosen or not — the leadership change in the BJP would have been delayed by another five years. In the Congress too, the leadership transition has been a long time coming. In 2009, Dr Manmohan Singh was the darling of the middle classes; Mrs Sonia Gandhi was very active with the allies even after the Left had parted ways; and Mr Gandhi was a youth icon. Today, the middle classes see Dr Singh as an ineffective instrument for furthering their aspirations, Mrs Gandhi has lost much of her energy and her son comes across as an on-again-off-again politician. In the run-up to the 2014 general election then, if the young Mr Gandhi wants to move centrestage, then that may not be a bad option at all. In family-led parties succession is pre-ordained. However, there is some disquiet in the Congress because even after nine years in active politics Mr Gandhi comes across as a reluctant entrant and his leadership has not picked up steam. In this context, his bold stand on the ordinance on convicted politicians has signalled that he wants to direct the party and, through it, the government. It has also catapulted him into media headlines at a time when his party’s arch-rival Narendra Modi had monopolised them. Had he chosen a different time and language to intervene, he may not have attracted the same attention. Mr Gandhi’s intervention has the added advantage of addressing the concerns of the middle classes at a time when his party’s urban vote base is threatened — in Delhi, by the first urban political party of India, the Aam Adami Party (AAP), and in the rest of India, by the appeal to urban youngsters of the BJP’s new found proto-fascist icon, Mr Modi. That Mr Gandhi is not for exigent compromises has been made clear to the public by the same media which has been quite hostile. Now Mr Gandhi would have to keep up the momentum of his public interventions. It would not do to confine himself to quietly rebuilding the party structure or playing a backroom role in pushing key reforms relating to food security, land acquisition and rehabilitation and direct cash benefits transfer. What he does behind the scenes is not apparent to the people. To signal that he is against the status quo, his actions have to be in the public eye. If Mr Gandhi wants to build on his latest policy foray then he should begin by putting pressure on the government to pass the Lokpal Bill in the Winter Session of Parliament and oppose any changes in the Right to Information Act aimed at exempting political parties from its ambit. These two measures would signal his commitment to make governance and politics accountable. Ambiguity on these issues can only erode his image as someone opposed to compromises driven by the exigencies of a rotting political culture. This might also help the Congress gain ground in Delhi from AAP which has its origins in the Lokpal Bill agitation. The first test of Mr Gandhi’s desire to change the future course of the Congress, however, will come in October itself — with the selection of candidates in the five states going to the polls in November. His success will be judged by his ability to prevent his party from fielding tainted candidates. Nowhere will this be more under scrutiny than in Delhi, which will be the barometer of how the Congress is likely to perform in the urban and semi-urban constituencies in the general election of 2014. His other major challenge is his attitude to his potential allies. He may not be in favour of pre-electoral alliances, but he needs to build good relations with present and future allies. Just as he walked into the Press Club, he needs to take a walk to A.K. Gopalan Bhavan for a coffee with Prakash Karat and Sitaram Yechury — in full knowledge that the Left will not come with the Congress as long as Dr Singh is the Prime Minister. He should sip tea at the feet of M. Karunanidhi when he is in Chennai, meet Mehbooba Mufti when in Srinagar and Nitish Kumar in Patna and visit Lalu Prasad Yadav languishing in jail. If he has to play a long innings, the present has to be viewed in a strategic perspective. Most importantly, Mr Gandhi might have to put the lawyers’ brigade in his party on the backfoot as they have eroded the party’s and the government’s image by their silver-tongued justification of morally indefensible policies. Though their virus-like spread is across the political spectrum, the Congress Party’s woes are particularly due to this breed of politicos who have the moral flexibility of a taxi-driver on the look out for the next fare. However, the time is short for a smooth transition of leadership in the Congress before the next general election. Even if the prospect is for the Congress to sit in the Opposition in 2014 — and that by no means is a given as Indian politics is not the extrapolation of urban biases — Mr Gandhi needs to take on frontally those who are fomenting communal and fascist tendencies in the country.

The writer is a journalist based in New Delhi