Congress struggles in Bihar with declining performance, lack of leadership, and disillusioned party workers.
New Delhi: After back-to-back losses in Haryana, Maharashtra and recently in Delhi Assembly elections, the Congress party appears to be a weaker political force in Bihar, a state which will witness the Assembly elections in the next six months.
A top state leader, who did not wish to be named, told The Sunday Guardian, “As far as the preparations for Bihar elections are concerned, the Congress party is a sinking ship and appears to be in no mood to learn anything from its previous failures.”
The grand old party will contest the crucial Bihar Assembly elections in alliance with the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD)-led Mahagathbandhan, but party leaders have expressed dissatisfaction with the functioning of the state unit and claim that “looking at the present situation, the party will lose badly, and all its cadre will drift toward the RJD.”
Another leader from Bihar, who has been working with the party for more than two decades, told TSG, “Our workers lack enthusiasm, and there is no one to back them or provide them with direction. Shockingly, the party leadership has still not constituted the Bihar Pradesh Congress Committee (BPCC)’s executive committee since 2017. In this situation, when there is no PCC, which is crucial for any state cadre, how will you win the elections?”
Senior leaders aware of the matter said that despite several letters being sent to the central leadership regarding the constitution of the BPCC executive committee, they never received any response.
“ I went to Delhi a few months ago to meet Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge and General Secretary K.C. Venugopal to provide them with the real picture of our state unit. I requested meetings with other top leaders, but surprisingly, I waited for 15 days, and nobody had the time to meet me. I returned, and now the picture is clear. Elections are just a few months away, and we do not have a PCC, nor do we have any Block or District units. Our presence at the grassroots level has been declining,” the leader said.
Additionally, Congress insiders blame Akhilesh Singh, the BPCC President and Rajya Sabha MP, who started his political journey with the RJD. Some claim that he is letting the party drift into the RJD’s fold while the central leadership seems uninterested.
Many state unit leaders are keen on his replacement to maintain the caste algorithm that Leader of Opposition Rahul Gandhi speaks about at the national level.
“What is the relevance of talking about caste census when you cannot implement the caste algorithm at your own state unit? Bihar is a state where the caste algorithm plays a key role in electoral politics, and we are lacking in that front as well,” a leader said.
It is pertinent to note here that Congress’s performance in Bihar has been declining over the years as the party relies heavily on Lalu Yadav’s RJD. In 2020 Assembly elections, the party secured victory in just 19 seats out of 70 it contested, while the RJD secured 75 seats.
If the grand old party fails in Bihar as well, its presence in the Hindi-speaking belt could be finished, but it seems Congress is not in the mood to learn from its failures.