Congress rebellion all but over

Anil Anand
Congress is not new to in-house rebellions and every time the party was reborn with changed profile, and at times changed nomenclature but with a renewed vigour. When a Group of 23 leaders or G23, led by veteran party-person Ghulam Nabi Azad rose in revolt not too long back, both friends and detractors of the party sorrowful and happy respectively, imagined that it was a deadly blow dealt at a time when the Congress is beset with a serious existential crisis. Some even saw the hidden hand of the ruling BJP’s top brass in fomenting fresh crisis in Congress to further weaken it, which was difficult to rule out.
Nothing of the sort happened. The party stays where it was, intact and indecisive-self at its best which is confirmed by further postponement of the president’s election and no action against some of the leaders daring the top leadership with impunity only for self-aggrandisement and nothing else.
Has the rebellion-2021 come to a full circle without creating any ripples? The answer lies in Congress president, Mrs Sonia Gandhi’s recent decision to set up a 13-memeber taskforce headed by none other than Mr Azad to organise and oversee the party’s COVID relief work. Mr Azad accepted the offer quietly.
Not only that, she appointed another committee tasked to analyse the reasons behind Congress’ dismal performance in recently held assembly elections to four states and one Union Territory, which had another rebel leader and Lok Sabha MP from Punjab, Mr Manish Tiwari as its member.
And who can forget another G23 leader and a rank follower of the Gandhi family, Mr Mukul Wasnik, who for reasons best known to him had joined the rebellious camp. It is another matter that he quickly backtracked and has now become member of the assembly elections fact-minding committee as well.
Not with standing the series of interviews that Mr Azad gave to different newspapers and channels after the revolt barely nine months back baring his teeth, reality seems to have dawned on him. He is neither in the bracket of the Congress syndicate of the 1960s that had stalwarts such as Mr Morarji Desai, Mr S Nijalingapa, Mr Ashok Mehta and many others including some strong regional leaders, nor has the guts to manoeuvre his way up like V P Singh, though briefly. It is a different matter that these moves either could not succeed or had limited success as in the case of Mr Singh.
The COVID-19 pandemic situation has provided an escape route both to the party leadership and the rebels particularly Mr Azad. The Congress Working Committee (CWC) meeting held on May 10, 2021 in the midst of pandemic, was all set to announce the election programme. Naturally, the conditions were not ripe and it was unanimously resolved to further postpone the election with even CWC members belonging to G23 and led by Mr Azad also gleefully concurring.
The seasoned campaigner that Mr Azad is, he or his ilk would not have liked to be seen further precipitating the crisis by insisting for the election when the country is fighting against the COVID-19 virus though Mrs Gandhi had expressed her willingness to announce the election schedule. The reality is that the G23 rebellion though had pleased quarters in the ruling BJP, failed to get much traction or support for the team Azad within the Congress. That is how the current situation provided an escape route to both the party managers as well as the rebels.
The offer to announce the elections provided an opening both to the leadership and the G 23 to find ground for a truce. The rebellious group having fallen into pieces could not have got a better escape route than the pandemic conditions to first agree to postponement of the party president’s elections for at least two months, and then Mr Azad and his compatriots accepting the assignments as a mark of goodwill. Clearly he seemed to have assessed his strength and in no mood to take the battle forward.
From all available indications Mrs Gandhi had come prepared to the CWC to announce the election schedule as drawn by another committee of party leaders who had sometime back given their report to her. Ostensibly, the CWC managers must have visualised that the G23 would be in no position to accept the schedule for June, 2021 election in view of the prevailing pandemic conditions which would have further impaired their capability to either field a candidate or canvass vigorously for their nominee across the country under these circumstances. So Mrs Gandhi made an offer to announce the schedule and take a high moral ground.
The G23 rebellion is all but over. It was expected not to lost long or would not have made any difference, but for psychological reasons to aid and abet the BJP’s ” Congress Mukt Bharat” campaign to some extent. However, it should not push the party decision makers (read Mrs Sonia Gandhi and her aides) further into the rot of complacency and indecisiveness.
Having withered the storm, they should use this as an opportunity to first hold the organisational elections as soon as the circumstances permit and not shirk from taking tough decisions. This should include sidelining or chucking out the vested interest both at the centre and states levels, give more opportunities to young, new and promising faces, and at the same time utilising the experience of the old-guard more so in the role of mentors. The writing must be clear on the wall and those who fail or ignore to read it should be dealt with accordingly- elections or no elections.
The G23 rumblings should be taken as a wakeup call by the party and its withering as an opportunity to restore the inner party democracy, quick decision making and devising a system of duties accompanied by a strong sense of accountability. Lack of accountability has been the bane of Congress’ current pathetic condition.
Everyone, particularly those among the old-guard wanted power/ responsibility, but refused to be accountable. In fact those who repeatedly honoured them with assignments never asked for accountability. It is so because there has been no system of fixing either accountability or assessing the performance being it being the ministers or while holding the party posts. The buck clearly stops at the table of the party president.
The self-perceived sense of indispensability, G23 was the outcome of this notion, has to go. This notion which has its genesis in status quo approach followed by the party over the decades, has widened the scope for manoeuvres and black-mailing which in turn has seriously harmed the organisational structure and stopped the process of grooming new leaders. Rather, perform or perish should be the underlying principle now.
On the hindsight the party should be thankful to Mr Azad and his grouping for dealing a direly needed jolt, whatever was the G23’s motive. Truce should not mean that they have been given a clean chit as it would be fraught with dangerous consequences in future and could encourage more rebellions.
The rebellion must come with some cost. It does not mean hard punitive measures. Certainly, a message should be sent loud and clear that the party discipline was as important for the senior/veteran leaders as for the rank and file and those found violating would be dealt with strongly even if it involved showing them the door.
No free lunches please.
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