Old party, new hands

Can Rahul Gandhi rejuvenate India’s GOP (grand old party) and change it into a GNP (grand new party)? His chances do not appear particularly bright. Why? He has been adept at appealing to emotions; not so clear about the nitty-gritty of politics, policies and programmes.

The 127-year-old Indian National Congress had no option but to anoint as its vice-president a 42-year-old who belongs to a family that has dominated the party for over half a century.
Rahul seems to be finally shaking off some of his diffidence. He says he eschews power which is like poison. But his lineage lends him influence. His critics claim he wields power without responsibility. How will he now perform? He had to emerge from the shadows.
What is of importance are his apparent attempts to draw a distinction between the old and the young, between an insensitive government and a responsive party, between a corrupt and decrepit administration and an alert and transparent civil society yearning for change.
This is hardly the first time a leader of the Congress has sought to convey an impression that he is talking tough and means business. Rewind to 1985, to the centenary session of the All India Congress Committee in Mumbai when a 40-year-old Rajiv Gandhi had not only promised to rid his party of “power brokers” but asked a question and replied, “What has become of our great organisation? Instead of a party that fired the imagination of the masses throughout the length and breadth of India, we have shrunk, losing touch with the masses.”
Rahul’s father’s statement sounds truly ironical today. His grandmother’s assassination by her bodyguards (with whom he learnt to play badminton) was followed by the most spectacular victory the Congress had ever won. In 1984, the party on its own won 404 out of the 543 seats in the Lok Sabha; 415 with its allies. Five years later, Rajiv Gandhi was no longer India’s Prime Minister. The Congress was never the same. The party won 197 seats in 1989 and 232 in 1991 after Rajiv’s assassination. The numbers of Lok Sabha MPs belonging to the Congress in the next five general elections were 140 in 1996, 141 in 1998, 114 in 1999, 145 in 2004 and 205 in 2009.
Over the last eight and a half years it has been in power, the Congress-led UPA government has become unpopular. Over the past few years in particular, the government’s inability to keep food inflation in check and curb brazen corruption has alienated large sections of the country’s electorate. In this period, Rahul’s mother Sonia Gandhi’s utterances have often highlighted a schism between the right (neo-liberal) and the left (socialist) sections in the party, between a detached government and a sympathetic National Advisory Council, comprising bleeding-heart activists.
Thus a government that is concerned about reducing the fiscal deficit and attracting foreign investors is also told how important it is to implement more effectively the world’s biggest social security programme (read, the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act).
Few will be surprised if the coming budget session of Parliament witnesses the introduction of new bills to enact laws on food security, land acquisition, reservation of seats in legislatures for women and perhaps, even the institution of a Lokpal (or people’s ombudsman). Other populist schemes could include free distribution of generic drugs to primary health centres.
All these new measures will surely have Rahul Gandhi’s approval. Who knows? He may start speaking more frequently in Parliament and even interact with the media. His track-record so far has not been particularly impressive. The performance of the Congress in the February-March 2012 elections to the Uttar Pradesh Assembly was pretty pathetic. In Gujarat, he campaigned for his party only at the final stage.
In July 2008 in the Lok Sabha, he referred to Kalawati from the Vidharbha region of Maharashtra, whose husband, son-in-law and daughter had all committed suicide.
But his views on what should be done to strengthen Indian agriculture and bring down the incidence of farmers’ suicide are not known. In May 2011, Rahul took up the issue of alienation of agricultural land in Bhatta-Parsaul. Earlier, in August 2010, he had addressed tribals at Lanjigarh in Orissa saying, “I am your soldier in Delhi.”
He never followed up any of these important issues that he himself flagged with any degree of diligence. He was nowhere on the scene when there was public outrage about the gangrape of the 23-year-old in Delhi.
He reportedly greatly values his personal space. But can he continue in this manner if he is indeed serious about his career as a public personality?
His views have often appeared somewhat simplistic. Is the main divide in India between an old order and a young generation impatient for rapid change? Or have high food prices hit the old as well as the young and further widened economic inequalities in a society that was already deeply divided between the rich and the poor, despite the emergence of upwardly mobile middle classes?
Rahul Gandhi (who turns 43 on June 19) has to address these issues, the sooner the better for him and his party. Narendra Modi, aged 62, is likely to be projected as the BJP’s prime ministerial candidate. The anticipated face-off between the two contrasting individuals may, however, eventually become irrelevant, that is, if the two largest political parties in the country put together do not emerge substantially stronger.
There is a possibility that the Congress will gain significantly only in Karnataka, which currently sends the largest contingent of 19 BJP MPs to the Lok Sabha. The BJP may not gain much ground in most states barring Rajasthan. The Congress is expected to weaken but the BJP may gain only marginally. Both parties could yield ground to smaller, regional parties after the 16th general elections if the Indian polity further fragments.
These may be highly speculative predictions but what is certain is that the year ahead will be politically eventful.

The writer is an educator and commentator