After 24 years, Congress will once again be in the hands of a non-Gandhi. Will he be able to stand and run alone? The questions are many. The challenges are many. Mallikarjun Kharge, almost 80 years old, will have to deal with all the challenges if the results of the presidential polls favour him. All the bitterness will come in his share. Today, when Kharge is likely to become the President, the party is going through its worst phase. If we go into the history of the party, then you will find that there has never been such a big challenge before. From Nehru to Gandhi to Indira Gandhi, the Congress did not get any special challenge from the opposition, which is the case today. After independence, the Nehru family dominated. When Indira Gandhi was challenged, she formed a new Congress and took the party forward with a new name.
After the formation of the new Congress, she got the first challenge in 1977, but after two years under her leadership, the party made a comeback. Then her son, Rajiv Gandhi, took over the command of the party. In the wave triggered by Indira’s death, the party led by Rajiv Gandhi wrote a new history, winning more than 400 seats. But after this victory, the graph of the party started falling. It is not over as of today. Rajiv Gandhi, who won a massive victory, could not handle the party. His loved ones started challenging him. As a result, the party lost the 1989 elections under his leadership. The Congress could not understand the politics of Mandal and Kamandal due to which the votes of the forward and backward castes slipped away from the party. The Congress also got messed up on the internal security and foreign policy fronts. As a result, another party president Rajiv Gandhi also became a victim of terrorists.
Since then, the party and the Gandhi family have begun to face challenges. After the death of Rajiv Gandhi in 1991, non-Gandhi P.V. Narasimha Rao took over the reins of the party. Shocked by Rajiv’s death, Sonia Gandhi kept herself away from politics. Rao started the tradition of electing the party president in a democratic way. After him, in 1997, there was election for the post of President. His supporter Sitaram Kesri defeated Rajesh Pilot and Sharad Pawar by huge margin of votes. Kesri got more than 6,000 votes. Pawar got more than 800 and Pilot could get only around 600 votes. From here, a new era began in the Congress. After the party’s defeat in 1996, a large section of the Congress inspired Sonia Gandhi to join politics.
It was feared that Rao and Kesri might tighten their grip on the party. Then an incident happened in Congress that was beyond comprehension. The office bearers of his time, including Kesri, were forcibly taken out of the Congress headquarters and handed over the command of the party to Sonia Gandhi.
Sonia Gandhi trained the old veteran leaders like Ahmed Patel, Arjun Singh, Narayan Dutt Tiwari, Ashok Gehlot, Abika Soni, Natwar Singh, Balram Jakhar, Sheila Dikshit, Kamal Nath, and Digvijaya Singh and slowly started running the Congress on their own terms. But Sonia Gandhi also contested the president’s election before taking over and took over again defeating Rao’s supporter Jitendra Prasad, although the BJP had become the ruling party at that time. The BJP resorted to Kamandal politics to suppress Mandal. Cases like Ayodhya had become an issue. In such a situation, Congress played the stake of the alliance for power. And in 2004, Congress won only 147 seats. With the help of the coalition led by her, the UPA government was formed at the Centre. Sonia Gandhi refused the post of PM and raised her stature very high in Indian politics. But Congress found the help of regional parties very expensive. The entire blame for corruption fell on the head of Congress. With this, the policy of Muslim appeasement is costing the party till date. BJP made Muslim appeasement a big weapon to woo the majority, and with the help of polarization, ousted the Congress from power in 2014, something the party has not been able to handle till date. The BJP got such a powerful face in Prime Minister Narendra Modi, which the Congress has not yet been able to handle. BJP and Prime Minister Modi are still making polarisation a big issue.
The first question is whether Kharge will be able to come out of the shadow of the Gandhi family. Probably not, Sonia Gandhi, Rahul Gandhi, and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra will remain the three power centers. Only Rahul Gandhi will give permission to change policy decisions. The biggest challenge before Kharge whether the party will be run with the help of the existing team of Congress or will he be able to make changes, because change is not very easy. From the centre to the states, the condition of the organisation is not very good. The first major challenge will be to strengthen the organisation by building it up. It is not very easy to unite the factions in the states. As far as policy decisions are concerned, removing the tag of Muslim appeasement will be the most important and difficult decision. The biggest weakness is that it is not able to leave the fascination of minorities, though minorities have left Congress in many states, including Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, and Bengal. Their trust in regional parties is increasing. It remains to be seen what Kharge does. Along with this, the Aam Aadmi Party has dented the Congress vote bank in many states, and it is to be seen how the Congress deals with this. Most important is the indifference towards state elections; Congress is not taking the states seriously after losing the Lok Sabha elections in 2019. It is like it has given up the fascination of the states. The BJP is taking advantage of this and throwing its full force on the states. For Kharge, elections are to be held in two states, Himachal and Gujarat, whereas Congress is not visible in the race and will not have time till 2024. Rahul Gandhi is making an effort to encourage the party with the Bharat Jodo Yatra. If Kharge’s experience and Rahul’s efforts are successful, then Congress can have good days again.
