Unlike 1967, 1977 and 1988, dissent is limited to murmur; no one is standing up to bell the cat.
The complete rout of the Congress in the Delhi Assembly elections has led to a cacophony of helplessness aired by a number of senior Congress functionaries. In the week gone by, an official spokesman of All India Congress Committee (AICC), who is a prominent face of the party on television debates, co-authored with another TV warrior of the party an editorial page piece in a prominent national daily to draw attention to “leadership vacuum” in Congress, which was described as “the elephant in the room”. They demanded that elections be held for the post of Congress president and for the Congress Working Committee (CWC). And this, they pleaded, must happen in the “next three to six months”. Sanjay Jha and Salman Soz, who wrote the piece, are perhaps reflecting the views of a section of the party, who, while not opposing the Sonia Gandhi family, are expressing their anguish at the ad hocism which has existed since 10 August 2019, when Rahul Gandhi stepped down as Congress president, owning responsibility for the party’s second successive drubbing in the Lok Sabha elections. His mother and predecessor as party chief, Sonia Gandhi, stepped in as the interim president and the concept of an acting and not active president has continued since.
No senior leader of the Congress has expressed his angst or anguish at the interim arrangement seemingly acquiring permanence. Since 1998, when Sonia Gandhi overthrew Sitaram Kesari to take over the reins, BJP has seen ten changes in its presidentship. Congress has restricted its choice to its “First Family” and the party seems to have reconciled to this oligarchy. Post the Delhi Assembly debacle, Ajay Maken, Salman Khurshid, Milind Deora, Sandeep Dikshit, Arjun Modwadia, Shashi Tharoor, Abhishek Manu Singhvi and former President Pranab Mukherjee’s daughter, Sharmishta, a spokesperson of the party, have spoken of the need to get out of the present stupor. While Tharoor has pointed out that in public perception the Congress is “adrift”, Singhvi has called for identification of “strong leaders”. Jha and Soz have demanded that party elections be held “under an independent non-partisan body of eminent citizens”. By implication the credibility of the present leadership is so low that the party needs to outsource its crucial organizational management in order to rejuvenate.
The only voice of protest, which has come with a positive connotation, is perhaps of ex-minister Manish Tewari, a Lok Sabha member from Punjab, who has said a debate is needed to reorient the party’s economic philosophy (which is perceived as Left, out of sync with modern times, perhaps) and clarity is needed on the party’s brand of nationalism and outlook on secularism. Tewari, a former president of the National Students Union of India, is the only one among those voicing anguish who has come up the hard way, climbing stairs in various levels of the party organisation and that is reflected in his constructive criticism.
Rahul Gandhi’s “chowkidar chor hai” diatribe did not cut ice with the people. The entry of Priyanka Vadra as a campaigner and then as general secretary of AICC had kindled hope: but with passage of time, as it is becoming increasingly clear that Sonia Gandhi prefers to hand the baton back to a reluctant Rahul Gandhi, the sheen of Priyanka’s entry seems to be wearing off. The recent communal riots in Delhi saw her lead a march in Central Delhi, while embers were in Northeast Delhi. Congress tradition has the saga of Ganesh Shankar Vidyarthi, who perished while trying to stop riots in Kanpur in March 1931. When riots were on in Delhi following partition, Mahatma Gandhi asked Indira Gandhi to work for communal harmony in the troubled walled city areas under the leadership of Subhadra Dutt (later Subhadra Joshi, who defeated Atal Bihari Vajpayee in 1962 Lok Sabha poll). The visit by the Congress delegation led by Rahul Gandhi to the riot affected Delhi areas when normalcy was limping back produced anti-Modi sound bites, but did not reflect the legacy that the party is heir to.
Dissent is not alien to Congress. In 1907 Surat meeting of the AICC, the rift between the moderates led by Rashbehari Bose (who presided) and the extremists led by Balgangadhar Tilak, Lala Lajpat Rai and Bipin Chandra Pal had seen unruly scenes and the party had split for a while. The election of Subhas Chandra Bose as party chief in Tripuri and Haripura caused Mahatma Gandhi to isolate him, necessitating his decision to quit the post and leave the party. Post Independence stalwarts like Jayaprakash Narain, Acharya J. B. Kripalani, Narendra Dev, Ram Manohar Lohia, etcetera, who disagreed with Jawaharlal Nehru, quit.
In 1967, the defeat of Congress in several state Assembly elections was not caused by non-Congress parties but by Congress dissidents who walked out to form their regional outfits: Charan Singh in UP, Mahamaya Prasad Sinha in Bihar, Biju Patnaik in Odisha, Kumbharam Arya in Rajasthan, Govind Narain Singh in MP and Ajoy Mukherjee in West Bengal (Pranab Mukherjee entered Parliament as a member of Ajoy Mukherjee’s Bangla Congress). These stalwarts did not only deny Congress majority in the Assemblies, but formed alternative governments in coalition with non-Congress parties.
In 1977, the trigger for Congress defeat came on 2 February, when Jagjivan Ram, H. N. Bahuguna and Nandini Satpathy walked out to form Congress for Democracy. Post defeat, a section of the leadership challenged Indira Gandhi and Sanjay Gandhi. They could not defeat her in the AICC election held in May 1977, which saw her nominee, K. Brahmananda Reddi defeat challenger Siddhartha Shankar Ray. Later, in January 1978, irked by her detractors, Mrs Gandhi walked out with her supporters to form Congress (Indira). Reddi, by then, had joined the rival camp and he continued to be at the helm of the rival party, then called Congress (Reddi); later renamed Congress (Swaran) when Swaran Singh replaced him. The 1979 Charan Singh government, which Mrs Gandhi supported for a while to oust the Janata Party regime of her bête-noire Morarji Desai, had Congress(S) as a constituent. After Congress(I) romped home in 1980, one by one most leaders of the other Congress rejoined Mrs Gandhi. The Congress(S), later led by Sharad Pawar, who had initially formed Samanantar Congress in Maharashtra, finally merged with Congress(I), post Mrs Gandhi in 1986, when Rajiv Gandhi was at the helm. Thereafter, there has been no split in Congress. In 1988, V.P. Singh quit on Bofors and formed Jan Morcha. In the 1990s, leaders have walked out to form their own outfits, like Pawar’s NCP, Mamata Banerjee’s Trinamool Congress, the YSR Congress in Andhra Pradesh, etcetera. Leaders like Himanta Biswa Sarma have caused Congress downfall in Assam by joining BJP.
No dissidence against the Congress leadership has been noticed since the 2014 debacle. In the light of this, the demand for elections raised by a section is significant. No clear challenger to the oligarchy of Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi is discernible. In 1969, Indira Gandhi used Article XIII, Section B, Clause D of the 35-page Congress Constitution, which provides for requisitioning a meeting of AICC, to defy the leadership of party chief, S. Nijalingappa. She, as Prime Minister, enjoyed the overwhelming support of 330 members of the total 427 party MPs (both Houses). By invoking the requisition provision, her supporters garnered the signatures of over 400 of the 700-odd AICC members and thus when Nijalingappa expelled her from the party in November 1969, a new party, Congress (Requisitionist), registered as Congress(R) in Election Commission records, emerged, which elected Jagjivan Ram as party chief. Nijalingappa’s party was recognised as Congress (Organisation), or Congress(O). In 1971, Congress(R) won 352 Lok Sabha seats as against 16 of Congress(O).
In today’s context, if a move for requisitioning a meeting of AICC is invoked it may not lead to a revolt against the Sonia Gandhi family. A new leadership, which may emerge after the exercise of requisition is carried out, may have legitimacy and be in a position to redefine the Grand Old Party. A Congress(R) may even mean Congress(Rahul). But if it emerges from a legitimately held election process, it has better chances of surviving the storm than the present Congress(I): Congress (Interim).