Congress Is Steadily Finding More Allies Despite Some Differences

As we head into another massive electoral season, starting with Karnataka assembly polls on May 10 and ending with the Lok Sabha 12 months later; two parallel political processes are at work.

These processes will play out in the coming months as the main actors figure out which way the voters can be swayed in their favour; What we can deduce now from their utterances is what their political calculations may be.

The first process is the attempt to create an overarching opposition alliance to take on the “world’s largest party” (BJP) in 2024. Logically, for a party which won a majority on the basis of its own vote of 37%, it should make the sense to feed the sense of disunity among its political opponents. But by showing great eagerness to get Rahul Gandhi out of the Lok Sabha after defamation verdict went against him, and by allegedly using the investigating agencies to target mostly opposition leaders, the party seems to be doing the exact opposite.

At Sunday’s meeting organized by Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge, as many as 15 opposition parties — including those who see Congress as the main enemy in their states— attended. Unless BJP thinks it needs no allies before 2024, its attitude is actually forcing the opposition to work together for its downfall.

On the other side of the equation, it should make equal sense for the opposition to bury contentious issues that emphasize their own conflicts of election. But this is what Rahul Gandhi did when he brought in a negative reference to Veer Savarkar riling his majority ally in Maharashtra, Shiv Sena. He opened up fissures in a state that sends the second largest number of MPs to Parliament after Uttar Pradesh.

The road to recovery, both for BJP and opposition, depends on how this first process plays out between now and May 2024. Since both sides seem tripping on this trust, we have to ask whether ego clashes are playing any role here.

This brings us to the second process at work, especially the dynamics between Congress and BJP. It is difficult to believe that some form of personal antagonism is not at work between Narendra Modi and Rahul Gandhi, as has been evident for more than eight years now.

The decisive moment in Modi—Rahul ego clashes began in early 2015, when the Gandhi scion called the Modi government a “suit—boot ki sarkar”. For most of his first term, Modi aggressively focused on rooting out black money, including the use of blunt instrument like demonetization. Did Gandhi’s diatribe rankle the PMs so much as to drive him to spend a lot of his energies trying to shake off the “suit boot” label? We can’t know the answer, but the question still needs asking.

After that we got the Raffle issue, the “Chowkidar chor hai” slogan and frequent references to India’s loss of territory before 2020 conflict in eastern Ladakh. These jabs cannot but hurt a politician who takes pride in his “strongman” image. Add the attempt to target Gautam Adani as a way of indirectly denting PM’s “clean” image, and we have one more data point and possibility of a personality clash here.

On the other hand, the Gandhi clan has been at the receiving end of BJP’s criticism about Nehru and his alleged role in weakening India economically and geo-politically. Given this backdrop, it is possible to suspect that the political moves of both BJP and Congress may, at least partially, be clouded by this clash of personal and political egos.

Can ego clashes derail broader requirements for unity even at regional level? It is likely that issues similar to one between Congress and BJP won’t dog the alliance process in states?

This problem exists in many states, except possibly Tamil Nadu, where DMK has managed to include Congress and Left in its alliance. In Kerala, Congress and Left need not combine because BJP is not a contender for power yet. But Telangana and Andhra Pradesh governing parties see Congress (apart from BJP) as rivals not worth aligning with.

In many states, the dominant party, whether regional or Congress, cannot easily accommodate its future ally at Centre. This is the case with Mamata Banerjee in Bengal, or Congress in Himachal Pradesh, MP, Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan, Gujarat and Delhi. States like Punjab and Karnataka will also see three or even four—horse races. Not exactly what the opposition may want but can take place. What is needed is to ensure that the non-BJP parties, even fighting among themselves in some states before Lok Sabha polls, unite in the post poll scenario. (IPA Service)