By Prem Chandran
Regional satraps, pretenders to the Delhi throne, can stand aside and sulk for now. The Congress under the leadership of Rahul Gandhi has staged a spectacular come-back, grabbing three geographically contiguous states in the central Hindi belt and putting Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the ruling BJP on notice. This is in part an anti-incumbency vote and in part a vote against the complacence of the BJP as a political establishment. Here’s guarantee that an ideal system of two prominent national parties calling the major shots in Delhi will continue, leaving less room for regional entities to try and indulge in power games at the apex of power.
Coming to the crux, sense the paradox. What the BJP aimed at somewhat arrogantly when Modi came to power in 2014 was a Congress-mukht Bharat. The results of the assembly polls in five states trashed this proposition as nothing more than wishful thinking. The Congress can now turn back and raise the banner of a BJP-mukht Bharat. In several of the recent polls, it is outwitting the saffron party. Even in the two states where the regional parties are set to take power now, the Congress emerged as the principal Opposition. However, the BJP can take some comfort in the fact that it was not a total washout for the party in the three states it ruled.
Rajasthan has a record of changing parties in government every time an assembly poll takes place. It repeated the trend this time too. In Madhya Pradesh, the BJP under Shivraj Singh Chouhan ruled the state for thirteen long years while it remained firmly entrenched in power in Chhattisgarh ever since its formation 15 years ago, under chief minister Raman Singh. This time, it is a total washout for the BJP in Chhattisgarh, with the Congress registering a two-thirds majority in the assembly and making major forays into the previous Congress bastions in urban areas.
The unmistakable message from this round of elections is that the upcoming Lok Sabha polls will be an uphill task for the prime minister and his party. Strong chances are that the Congress will muster enough support to fight the PM and the BJP to the finish. Cobbling such an alliance will now be easier. Importantly, it will now be Rahul Gandhi who will be in the forefront of this push. He has by now adequately and impressively proven to be a leader who means business; one with drive to first to take the party out of the woods and then to install governments in three major states alongside Punjab as well. The party shares power in Karnataka, thanks to Rahul’s deft handling of a critical situation post poll there, and the party runs the government in Puducherry as well. Notably, the shadow of his mother Sonia Gandhi still looms over his leadership as also the Congress establishment. Most of Sonia Gandhi’s advisers are around Rahul too, while the new leader has drafted a set of young Turks too to take his ideas forward. Together, they made a success out of the new party chief.
Overnight, the likes of Mamata Banerjee of West Bengal who considered Rahul Gandhi as her “junior” in politics might see a shrinkage of their stature. Banerjee has just one state with her against Rahul Gandhi’s six. So too for Chandrababu Naidu, whose aim in Telangana this time was to put his Telugu Desam into power alongside the Congress, so that he could claim the status of a leader with not one, but two states in his kitty. Naidu was shown his place by the voters in Telangana, giving him no more than a handful of seats. His party’s vote share in Telangana this time shrunk to just over three per cent from the 15 per cent it claimed in the 2014 polls. His survival in native Andhra Pradesh is also in serious doubt. Another crafty politician Jaganmohan Reddy is waiting in the wings to grab his chair. This, at a time when the public mood is turning against the CM. With what face can Naidu rush to Delhi the next time – which he keeps doing every week as the self-appointed architect of the grand alliance against Modi and the BJP? It’s a moot point whether Rahul Gandhi would now give Naidu the same patronage he did in the recent weeks by allowing him be in the forefront of the push!
The Congress has, however been edged out the North-East as a whole, with long-time chief minister Lal Thanhawla bowing of office in Mizoram. This makes this sensitive and largely spread landmass out of bounds for the Congress at least in the immediate term. Yet, the Congress is there in power in the north, the south and the west, not to mention the central region which it has reclaimed. Clearly, its claim to being the Grand Old Party (GOP) with a nationwide organisational network and people’s support stands reinforced and reasserted. It’s here to stay, season after season, perched in the apex or spread over the plateau. It goes to show regional parties have less of space at the Centre. Chances of a coalition government after the 2019 polls still remain high. Yet, the comfort is that it would either be the Congress or the BJP that would lead it from the front; not the scheming regional satraps.
All these go to show that the fight for the next Lok Sabha hustings would principally be a fight between Narendra Modi and Rahul Gandhi. This is a matter of some relief. A projected possibility till the other day was something different; to decide on the leader of the grand alliance after the polls, giving room for others to step in as well. What would one make of a nation led by a disruptor like Banerjee, a pretender like Naidu or a footloose Mayawati? By contrast, see the grace with which a Naveen Patnaik minds his business despite his long innings in power in Odisha and having a rightful claim of being among the senior politicians with considerable administrative acumen?
So, what after the semi-finals? Will Narendra Modi keep the reins to himself? While Modi has quietly done a job, his flaws are there for all to see. As he approaches the next polls, a question is, what gives the voter the urge to put him back in saddle? He treaded a careful course, in keeping with the discipline that he imbibed from his RSS pracharak days. It helped; and avoided serious problems in governance. Yet, it might be stressed that India requires a leader who would confront situations with a stronger sense of grit, determination and speed. This is not to argue that Rahul Gandhi, the new knight in shining armour, could be a better choice.
