“If they answer not your call, walk alone, walk alone” one of Rabindranath Tagore’s great poems, set to music used to be one of the favourite songs of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, the most famous Congressman to don khadi. If the charismatic prophet of non-violence sang it in many a trying times, another Congressman in salt and pepper beard trudging across the country these days who shares nothing except the sur name with the Mahatma ” The Great Soul” cannot afford to walk alone; Rahul Gandhi and the Congress can ill afford to pick and choose fellow political travellers if a tangible challenge to BJP is to be put up at 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
Of course, the former Congress chief has his party activists together with some of the followers of likeminded political parties in his Bharat Jodo Yatra. An invitation from party chief Mallikarjun Kharge to 23 political outfits have led to the footfall of fellow travellers from other parties in BJY.
But the response from “like-minded, secular parties” have been lukewarm to say the least. As the state Yatra, a follow up of BJY passed through West Bengal where the Left who contested polls in the state in alliance with Congress was not officially represented.. Two actors, Badshah Moitra and Srilekha Mitra who are known to empathize with Left causes only took part.
Incidentally, Arvind Kejriwal’s Aam Aadmi Party, Bharat Rashtriya Samity led K Chandra Sekhar Rao and newly floated party Ghulam Nabi Azad’s Democratic Progressive Azad Party were notable exclusions in Kharge’s list of invitees. The realisation does not seem to have dawned on the veteran Congress leader that his invite is no longer an opportunity to other outfits to dine at the high table.
AAP’s electoral triumph over BJP in Delhi and Punjab makes Kejriwal and his party leaders ideal candidates to join BJY. Congress’s failure in these two states seems to have weighed on Kharge’s decision. But this should not have happened. This indicates narrow view of the Congress leadership since the BJY has been talking of spreading love and not hatred.
Rao-led BRS trouncing both BJP and Congress in Telangana together with his chance of walking into the saffron camp seems be the reason behind his name not being a part of the “select list.”. Having broken away from the Congress has made Azad a pariah to it.
But in the process, Kharge has overlooked the anti-BJP credentials. But the absence of these leaders and their rank and file in BJY seem to defeat it’s goal of uniting the nation against communalism, divisiveness and hate for it gives a go-by to the time tested adage that there are no permanent friends and enemies in politics.
If the list of invitees is given a look, All India Trinamool Congress figures in it. This is despite the fact Congress sometimes in alliance with the Left had pitted itself against Trinamool in every electoral battle post-2011. Even in Tripura, Congress and the Left are talking of alliance excluding Trinamool.
Though Trinamool and Congress closed ranks against the Left Front and ousted it in 2011, the same year witnessed the two parting ways. Congress had walked out of the state government while Trinamool leadership had in so many words stated that it couldn’t care less.
Political relationship between the two worsened down the years. It was political expediency and legal compulsions that made Trinamool legislators vote in favour of Abhishek Manu Singhvi a Rajya Sabha nominee of Congress from West Bengal.
Addressing an election rally in north Bengal in 2021, Rahul Gandhi pointed out BJP gives call for a Congress-mukt Bharat and not a Trinamool-mukt one, thereby implying that the ruling dispensation in West Bengal and the saffrons have chosen to avoid a confrontation. Small wonder, Trinamool leaders chose to ignore the Congress invite choosing not to be a part of BJY ‘s final rally on January 30 with flag hoisting in Srinagar by Rahul Gandhi.
The bitter exchanges between Trinamool and Congress during successive Assembly sessions between 2016 and 2021 were not taken into account when the Congress chief sent his invite to Trinamool leadership. Therein lies a doublespeak as both TMC supremo, Mamata Banerjee and NCP chieftain Sharad Pawar both of whom had left Congress being invited to the BJY, Ghulam Nabi Azad who left the party recently being left out as his outfit is being considered a political minnow.
Rahul Gandhi is claimed to said that he has reinvented himself. But it seems that the outfit he once headed and where his opinion is often the last word is yet to do so. Fighting with its back to the wall, it has escaped the mind of the Congress leadership that it bagged only 52 seats in 2019 Lok Sabha polls. In 2021, it’s tally was reduced to a zero in state Assembly election in West Bengal
The Congress needs an Opposition phalanx cutting across party lines more than the constituents of this party enclave needs the “grand old party”. Unlike the Congress, the regional parties have the mass connect to defeat BJP as Banerjee and Pawar have shown
The BJY marks a beginning with inclusivity as its key note. To make a successful conclusion, it is time for the Congress leadership to give up its ego as the first step to political rejuvenation. (IPA Service)
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