Given the election calendar, Congress now needs to continuously ensure Rahul Gandhi stays front and center in national attention as a credible political figure. Here’s an irony: when it’s easy for Gandhi to appear credible, it’s thanks to BJP, when it’s tough for him to do so, it’s thanks to Congress. And, further irony, the impact of the second outweighs that of the first.
The weekend following Friday’s parliamentary debate saw Rahul Gandhi chairing his first Congress Working Committee (CWC) meeting, and yet another terrible lynching incident, this time in Alwar, Rajasthan. CWC let everyone know that in the event Congress commands the most number of seats in general elections, Gandhi will be applying for the PM’s job. You can hardly get more underwhelming than this when trying to market a potential prime ministerial figure.
The statement betrayed the well-recognized reality that Congress is in absolutely no position to (a) command anything close to a national electoral majority, and (b) ensure fealty from regional political overlords whom it seeks as allies. Congress, or Gandhi, at this point, doesn’t seem to have a story that can lift him — or, at least, appear to lift him — above this brute reality.
The Alwar tragedy, in contrast, afforded Gandhi a ready platform to critique BJP and Narendra Modi. Congress’ president appears more convincing when he takes on BJP leaders for their inability and/or unwillingness to respond in time and adequately to Alwar-like incidents.
Think back to Gandhi’s no-confidence motion speech in the Lok Sabha. He appeared more convincing when he positioned himself and his party against what he described as BJP’s wink-wink, nudge-nudge approach to the uglier manifestations of majoritarian politics. In contrast, when he listed those jumps, supposed to be a critique of the Modi government’s performance, Gandhi’s own performance was tepid.
That tepidness comes from a fundamental weakness in Gandhi’s and his party’s politics: neither he nor Congress has anything close to an alternative policy vision that challenges Modi-led BJP’s.
Build a Better Mousetrap
In an earlier comment in these pages, we had argued that Modi needs a new narrative if he’s to lead BJP to another majority in general elections ( Read here). The PM’s speech didn’t give enough evidence that he’s started fashioning such a story. But he has the political talent and just about enough time to execute a major rewrite.
Gandhi is nowhere near as talented as a politician, and given that Congress has done little to brand-differentiate itself from BJP on policy, there may be very little time. That’s why Congress is a weak point for Gandhi when he tries to come across as a credible political challenger.
One can, of course, appreciate Congress’ difficulties. On policy, Modi-led BJP has frequently repackaged and relaunched a bunch of Congress ideas and reworked a traditional Congress political economic approach to making it appear grander.
Modi’s message is that he’s for high welfare spending for the poor and against iniquitous behavior by the rich. That used to be a default Congress message. Congress’ messaging, and indeed policy execution, was poorer than Modi’s is. But the fact remains, Modi has cleverly repackaged a largely Congress story and basically left Congress with no story.
Gandhi’s and his party’s policy critiques consist of carping about execution and results. GST could have been better implemented. More jobs should have been created. Growth should have been faster. China could have been better handled.
All of that, at some level, is true. But they don’t tell voters what Congress wants to do sharply differently. True, Congress’ performance bar for next general elections is set lower than BJP’s. Modi is seriously aiming for nothing less than another majority. Congress will be beside itself if it gets around 130 — provided anti-BJP, non-Congress parties get enough to start talking about government formation.
But even with this lower bar, Congress’ lack of an alternative policy story is a serious weakness in part because it makes the man Congress wants to project as a prime ministerial candidate appear less credible.
Aren’t their votes in Congress’ critique of BJP’s inadequate responses to Alwar-like incidents? Especially because Gandhi looks more convincing when he takes on BJP in this fashion? It’s by no means certain that there will be a counter-reaction from a sizeable section of Hindu voters to past and future Alwars.
Voters mostly dislike law and order breakdowns and punish incumbents. But awful incidents like the last weekend’s haven’t, in their cumulative impact on perception, coalesced into a popular feeling that BJP can’t be trusted to maintain order. If that remains the case, Congress will receive limited electoral dividends from BJP’s anemic responses to Alwars.
Who Moved My Cheese?
So, maybe, while BJP knows that every time it doesn’t confront an Alwar head-on, it makes Gandhi look better.
It also knows that’s not enough for Gandhi and Congress. And, perhaps, BJP reckons there are dividends to be earned from their current approach. Of course, in a volatile democracy like ours, there’s no iron-clad guarantee that future Alwars won’t change public perception about BJP and maintaining order.
But unless that happens, Rahul Gandhi will be handicapped by a double irony.
