Priyanka Vadra is all set to enter the Parliament after winning the Wayanad Lok Sabha seat in Kerala vacated by his brother Rahul Gandhi by surpassing his victory record margin of over 3.6 lakhs. While her victory adds to the growth of the family of trio, mother, son and daughter it signals the annihilation of the Congress Party that actively participated in India’s independence struggle, once.
There were times when Congress used to lose elections but still managed several seats in their area of influence in several states retaining its national character. This started vanishing slowly since the younger scion of the family overtook the reigns of the Congress Party and started losing state after state in the last few decades. The decline of a strong democratic and most powerful party started when it became a family’s fiefdom. Sanjay Gandhi who was responsible for Congress’ defeat in 1977 after the Emergency engineered the annihilation of the human rights of Indians.
Subsequently, Rajiv Gandhi was anointed as the prime minister of India after Indira Gandhi’s assassination in 1984, his only credentials being her son. He later won the elections and got a historic mandate on a sympathy sentiment. During his term corruption rose and travelled faster than the speed of light in numbers and magnitude he acknowledged himself when he famously said, that when centre pays a rupee for development works, only 15 paise reach the end user. Thus, the foundation of the Congress Party demolition was laid by the trio of the family of Indira Gandhi and her two sons. The methodology that was responsible for the destruction of the party was the concept of a “coterie” developed by Sanjay Gandhi. This involved picking up young loyalists under the garb of “young talents” and plant them on top and calling them strategists. What followed was a complete lack of meritocracy and only an assertion of loyalty to the family for their survival.
The downhill of Congress continued when Sonia Gandhi was appointed President of the party after the assassination of Rajiv, again her credentials being his wife, a family enterprise. The senior leaders and loyalists of the family lost an opportunity to make course corrections and refused to look beyond the Gandhi family and find fresh leadership, a glimpse of which was seen during the brief period of P V Narasimha Rao’s regime. Sonia proved to be a very poor leader, and her only agenda was to pass on the baton to her children, Rahul and Priyanka, again their only credentials being her progeny. Even an intellect like Manmohan Singh fell prey to her design by remaining a dummy Prime Minister and tolerating the whims and fancies of a much junior and younger Rahul Gandhi.
Rahul Gandhi inherited the coterie concept of his uncle and is surrounded by yes men loyal to him and his family. He is playing the pro-minority and caste cards to garner votes to come to power by appeasing Muslims in the country and practicing divisional caste politics. As a reaction, the country is witnessing a rare Hindu consolidation behind leaders of the Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP). His rant against a popular Prime Minister like Narendra Modi within and outside the country is going against him and exposing him as a leader who is bereft of any intellect and leadership abilities and bringing down the image of the age-old Congress Party. His efforts like the Bharat Jodo or the Nyay yatra have failed to create any impact and are seen as political gimmicks because of his inconsistency in what he says.
Rahul Gandhi is pitted against a strong Prime Minister like Narendra Modi who is leading the ruling BJP that boasts of several good leaders in line with a dedicated cadre that Congress lacks. Rahul Gandhi is a mismatch to the popularity of Narendra Modi who is presently the most respected leader throughout the world. The country is witnessing great economic development and has become the fifth-largest economy under his leadership. India is expected to overtake Germany and Japan to become the third-largest economy in the world, soon. The world is awed by the digital transformation of India and seeking help to adopt and follow our country. In the reign of Narendra Modi corruption did reduce significantly, though it isn’t gone completely. The Make in India policy did help the Indian Army and unprecedented development in the border areas has sent strong signals to neighbouring China and Pakistan. A few surgical strikes in Pakistan and skirmishes in Sikkim and Ladakh have established the supremacy of the Indian Army. There are several course corrections like abrogation of Article 370 is already done and other historical blunders of the Congress, post-independence are in the offing and waiting to be corrected, soon. At present, Modi government is ticking all the boxes, but the situation will not be the same after him as the power tussle within the party takes over as a natural progression.
It is time that Congress looks beyond the family and emerges as a strong nationalist political party, as any system needs checks and balances, especially the political system. Otherwise, the scope for misuse of political power is immense as seen in a totalitarian system that has oligarchs. Today, India has a free press and a proactive judiciary, but what we lack is constructive opposition. The live telecast of the Parliament proceedings exposes our opposition leaders indulging in obstructive politics with no regard either to the chair or the Prime Minister of the country. Even, when government does something good, they engage in shouting and stage walkouts.
The need of the hour is a strong constructive opposition working in the nation’s interests by ensuring good governance, preventing misuse of power and preventing complacency from creeping in and not allowing the ruling party to take victory for granted on account of the TINA (There Is No Alternative) factor.
