What Next for Congress Party’s Star Campaigner?
Whatever the results, Priyanka Gandhi Vadra has clearly emerged as the Congress party’s star campaigner. Will she be given a larger role post the elections, and more importantly, will this role be in Parliament or outside it? For don’t forget that Rahul Gandhi has contested on two seats and seems well placed to win both Wayanad and Rae Bareli. Which one will he give up and will one of these go to his sister? While the party would want Rahul to retain Rae Bareli, his instinct seems to be to stay on as the MP from Wayanad as that is a state that has provided the Congress much succour in the past. In fact, as the buzz goes, Rahul was not keen to contest from Uttar Pradesh but it was Akhilesh Yadav who finally prevailed on him. Meanwhile, Priyanka has given the BJP a good fight in Amethi as well, managing the campaign for the party candidate K.L. Sharma and camping in the region for three weeks. So much so that the BJP is not as confident of retaining Amethi as it was before the campaign. In fact the Congress slogan in Amethi was that while Rahul Gandhi is contesting two seats, he will win in three (Amethi by proxy). While that may not be the case, it would be interesting to see what he does with the two that he will (probably) win.
The Next Cabinet
So confident is the BJP of winning that there is already talk of the next cabinet. The Prime Minister is all set with the agenda for the next 300 days, the swearing-in date and venue seem to be finalised as well, he has confirmed India’s participation at various international fora and knowing Modi he may well have the new cabinet all planned and ready. The question of course will be: how many of the “outsiders” who have recently joined the BJP be accommodated? And then of course there are the allies—for being Modi his focus is not always on the current election but the coming state elections as well. But from all accounts, everything is ready. Now only the EVMs have to deliver.
Reality Check for Arvind Kejriwal
If one thing Aam Admi Party leader Arvind Kejriwal must be regretting is his Rajya Sabha seat selection. All the three Rajya Sabha seats distributed by him were missing in action during his arrest and for the large part during the election campaign. Swati Maliwal’s case of course is well known, but Harbhajan Singh and even Raghav Chadha were missing during the protests against their leader’s arrest. Perhaps he would indeed have been better off giving the seat to Abhishek Manu Singhvi as the rumour mills claim he is planning to do. But catch any of the three giving up their seats in this political game of musical chairs.