Grand Central Name Calling

Many cerebral and analytical ways of deciphering the stinging letter to the Congress high command by 23 top party leaders and the stormy Congress Working Committee meeting on August 24 have been proffered by political commentators. Yet, the real trigger for these machinations might simply have been the Grand Old Party’s desire to give everyone—Congress members inclu­ded—frustrated with months of pandemic blues, economic distress and border conflict a solid reason to just let off steam. As a party that doesn’t seem to be doing much for the past six years besides losing elections and governments, was the Congress trying to fulfil its obligation towards national service by giving citizens a few days to bond over the opium of politics?

It is difficult to rationalise why else experienced leaders of a party under a prolonged spell of existential crisis would cause a cacophony of discord among themselves only to reaffirm status quo ante. The letter sent to Sonia Gandhi by 23 of her trusted colleagues—including five former chief ministers, four CWC members, former Union ministers and MPs—days before she completed a year as the party’s int­erim chief demanded radical changes in the Congress organisation along with an “effective, visible and full-time leadership”. The demands, per se, were not new. They had been raised several times over the past year, ever since Rahul Gandhi’s resignation from the Congress presidency forced Sonia to fill the void, temporarily.

The reason for the brouhaha, thus, was two-fold. First, the signatories to the letter—Congress leaders from across India, of varied age groups. Veterans like Ghulam Nabi Azad, Anand Sharma, Veerappa Moily, Bhu­pinder Hooda, Kapil Sibal and P.J. Kurien had signed it, as had relatively younger Congressmen like Manish Tewari, Mukul Wasnik, Milind Deora and Jitin Prasad. Second, and more imp­ortantly, the letter appeared in a nat­ional daily just a day ahead of a scheduled CWC meeting, giving the imp­ression of an open rebellion against Sonia by leaders considered her time-tested loyalists. By the time the CWC met the following day, repo­rts of Sonia having decided to resign had come pouring in amid rumours—pushed hard by likes of axed Congress spokesperson Sanjay Jha--that other party bigwigs are expected to come out in open support of the 23 pro-reform leaders.

As the CWC began its virtual meet, Sonia told colleagues that she was stepping down and that they must begin discussions on her successor. What followed was exactly the opposite. The contents of the letter hardly came up for debate but its signatories came under scathing criticism for ‘betraying’ the Nehru-Gandhi family and strengthening the BJP. Leading the charge was Rahul, who chastised Azad and his co-signatories for seeking a leadership change while the Congress was trying to save its government in Rajasthan and Sonia was admitted to a Delhi hospital. Azad, a party loyalist of nearly 50 years often handpicked by Sonia as her emissary on important ass­ignments in the past, offered to resign from the party if it could be proven that he had helped the BJP in any way.

A signatory to the letter who is not part of the CWC tells Outlook, “the party displayed a lynch mob mentality…we were made to look like treacherous men disloyal to the party and the first family; decades of commitment and sacrifice were forgotten.” Over 40 of the 50 members present, including former PM Manmohan Singh, A.K. Antony, Ahmed Patel, Ambika Soni and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra were unsparingly critical, terming the letter “irresponsible” and “cruel”.

After seven hours of muckraking, the party was back to square one. Sonia made a closing statement asserting that she was “not hurt by the letter, but bec­ause it was leaked” and that she held “no ill-feeling” against the signatories. A resolution, moved by Manm­o­han, was adopted, asking Sonia to continue as party chief till an AICC session can be convened to find a repl­acement, while authorising her to rev­amp the organisation. Congress sources inf­ormed Outlook that it was also decided, at the advice of Rahul and Priyanka, to constitute a four-­member committee to help Sonia run the party’s daily affairs. The AICC session, which most wanted convened “within a year”, is expected to be cal­led “within six months” at the insi­ste­nce of Rahul, a CWC member says. It remained unclear, though, whether Rahul, who resigned the presidency last year demanding a non-Gandhi rep­lacement, is willing to return at the helm.

Though the CWC meet has settled the leadership question for now, the questions raised by the 23 leaders in their letter remain unanswered. The pro-reform group presently claims it is satisfied with the outcome of the CWC meet and will look forward to the roadmap that Sonia works out. However, several signatories Outlook spoke to maintain that the party has only “moved from one interim arr­angement to another” and that they will “have to wait till the promised AICC session to decide the next course”. Mukul Wasnik and Vivek Tankha, both signatories, insist the letter was not a challenge to Sonia or the Gandhi family but “a parchment of act­ion to strengthen the party” and that even those who viewed their dem­ands as an offence “will realise that the issues are worth consideration”.

Many Congress leaders not party to the letter, including CWC members who criticised the 23, admit that the merit beh­ind the suggestions for organisational overhaul, ideological clarity and visible leadership cannot be denied. A day after the meeting, Gandhi family loyalist Mani Shankar Aiyar wrote to Sonia, lending his support to the letter’s dem­ands. “There is nothing that is against the party or the Nehru-Gandhi family; these are constructive suggestions that anyone who wishes well for the Congress must endorse,” Aiyar says. It is learnt that the letter had also been endorsed by as many as 280 other party leaders, but that their names were not mentioned as signatories bec­ause authors “did not wish to convey a message of rebellion”.

Anyone familiar with the working of the Congress—few would know this better than the 23 signatories—is aware that a leader’s future is short-lived after a taint of ‘betraying’ the Gandhis. Why did the leaders, then, take the risk, particularly if they are happy with the CWC meet’s outcome of continuity for Sonia? One signatory says it’s important to und­erstand the circumstances under which they put their demands in writing. “A key concern among us was the impression that Rahul, while refusing to take the reins of the party, had been back-seat driving… for the past year, he enjoyed power without responsibility, even though there was no question of anyone rebelling against him should he take charge again. His stamp was seen in all party appointments and in our Rajya Sabha nominations. We wanted it made clear who is in-charge (sic),” says the leader.

Former Karnataka chief minister Veerappa Moily, one of the signatories, tells Outlook, “the party needs to come alive again and that is what we asked”. In 2007, Sonia had set up a committee of party leaders to address “future challenges” before the Congress; Moily was its head. “The future challenges of 10 years ago have become present challenges now, but we are still not doing anything to address them,” Moily says, adding that “no other political party in India, including the BJP, has the experience and talent that the Congress has but it’s a pity that we are letting it waste idly… none of us are running after posts, but we want to feel needed in the party.”

The signatories say most of their concerns would be addressed “if only Rahul came clean on his intention of leading the party and let go of his distrust of senior and mid-level Congress leaders”. They say Rahul’s loyalists del­iberately give a wrong impression that party seniors do not back the Wayanad MP when he takes on the government. “Rahul acts in a vacuum. His period of activity is transient and barring some of his very close confidantes, he doesn’t discuss his political plans with anyone. When we don’t know what we need to support, how do we support it… we can’t just parrot what Rahul says; we need to discuss with him how to justify the stand he takes,” says a party MP who signed the letter. The leader adds that he once asked Rahul why he was so adamant about not taking over the party and was surprised by the response. “He told me bluntly that he doesn’t trust half the people in the Congress because they are in cahoots with the BJP,” the MP says.

Rahul loyalists accuse the letter-writers of being “self-serving politicians who are now uneasy with the party beca­use we are not in power and they can’t bec­ome ministers.” A CWC member and Rahul acolyte says, “Many of these people who are calling for collective leadership hold party positions; some are in charge of different states…when they carry out party work in Haryana or Rajasthan, are they not doing it collectively with other leaders? It is only when we lose elections that they find it convenient to blame Sonia or Rahul; when we win they say it was collective effort or state leadership that helped”.

There is no end to the arguments and mudslinging between the pro-reform lobby and the status-quoists. However, none of them seems to have any real answer on how the party can effectively stop the BJP juggernaut or how Congress can regain lost ground in states like UP, Bihar, Bengal, Andhra, Telangana, Odisha or the entire Northeast. The 23 signatories claim their purpose was precisely to address this drift; their rivals point out that many of the co-authors—Jitin Prasad, Raj Babbar, Renuka Chowdhury and others—belong to these states and have done little to help revive the Congress at the grassroots.

While this blame game continues, the BJP under Narendra Modi has been going ahead with its political agenda unchecked—be it with the abrogation of Article 370 in J&K or the construction of Ram Mandir in Ayodhya or passage of the Citizenship Amendment Act. The Congress occasionally lets out a squeal of protest, when it’s not busy playing its leadership merry-go-round.