Anil Anand
The price rise and the resultant steep inflationary trend is an issue which the reluctant and divided opposition should have focused on with full might if they were to corner the Narendra Modi government. Notwithstanding the multiple divisions in the opposition camps ahead of the coming round of assembly elections including the politically significant Uttar Pradesh, the Congress went ahead with holding a massive national rally at Jaipur on December 13.
The significance of the event could be gauged from the fact that despite her ill-health the Congress president, Sonia Gandhi traveled to the Pink City to preside over the event, though she refused to address the rally, in order to enthuse the party rank and file. That also reflects that the Congress is in a do or die situation with regional satraps such as Trinamool Congress chief, Ms Mamta Banerjee challenging the over a century old party’s credentials to become fulcrum of the opposition unity.
Every political rally or event is held or organised not merely as a mark of protest, or eulogy for a particular development if the organisers happen to be the ruling party. The past trend has been that such events are organised also either as a show of strength or send across messages to the rank and file as well as the public at large in context with the prevailing situation, mostly political.
Many saw the anti-price rise rally as an attempt to re-lay a platform for anointing Rahul Gandhi or try to establish his supremacy. But that did not seem to be the case or the only cause.
The national rally on the issue of price rise is a natural culmination of the Congress’s protestations, in many forms, against the rising prices particularly of petrol and diesel. And it was planned to be a mega show but with only a change of venue from Delhi to Jaipur which was necessitated after Delhi Police refused permission to allow the event in the capital city.
Such political rallies are usually organised with a theme in mind as price-rise was the title in the case of Jaipur rally. Nevertheless, the leaders do not let the opportunity go to focus on other issues as well. Jaipur was no different in that regard as Mr Gandhi and other leaders touched upon other issues as well.
A pointer to this was Mr Gandhi’s broadside launched against Prime Minister Mr Modi and the ruling BJP on the issue of Hindutva or distinguishing it from Hinduism. Exactly a month after he had raised this issue of distinction for the first time while addressing an AICC training programme at Wardha, he chose Jaipur to take this debate further and the idea ostensibly was to sanitize the party leaders and workers, gathered from across the country, about the issue. As the address to Wardha conference was limited to a small gathering, a public rally of this magnitude certainly was a chance for him to broaden the canvas of his Hindutva versus Hinduism debate.
Primarily, there were two main messages that the party wished to convey from the platform of the price-rise rally apart from highlighting the inflation. Firstly, an attempt has been made to chart a two-pronged course of debate to corner the ruling party and particularly Mr Modi. Firstly on the issues of “mis-governance” such as price rise and national security and secondly to take the ruling party head-on on ideological issues.
Both the ingredients were visible in this rally and more of which is expected in the days to come. The first prong was depicted by the theme of the rally whereas the course for fighting on ideological grounds was set by Mr Gandhi through his Hindutva versus Hinduism debate. The tone and tenor of his observations on this issue clearly suggested that the Congress is preparing for a slugfest and challenge the ruling dispensation’s purported hegemony to depict itself as guardian of a particular religious group.
Although some quarters within the Congress had expressed reservations when he touched upon this debate during his address to the AICC training camp. But there are strong sections within the Congress and outside who felt that the party must take a clear stand on the issue particularly on Hindutva as the BJP’s political plank.
The old-timers in the Congress who believed that the silence is golden and that the storm would blow over on its, own are not only becoming outdated in the party but also losing strength. In this era of optics there is no scope for ambiguity leave alone the silence. The party would be required to strategically frame its stand on key ideological and political issues being successfully exploited by the ruling BJP. The silence is golden but it certainly has its pitfalls when the political rival happens to be Mr Modi backed by well-oiled organisational machinery. The silence in such a case could be misconstrued as a weakness, a projection successfully done by the BJP strategists. Or else it could also reflect concurrence. Luckily for Congress the concurrence would not stand ground given the direct ideological fight which the party has with the outright religion based politics of the BJP.
The second and equally important aspect or the motive behind this rally was to use the occasion not only as a show of strength but also portray inner party unity which has been a big trouble spot for the Congress high-command. The latest challenge had come in the form of rebelling Group 23 leaders.
The Group 23 has though been considerably decimated but the party’s top brass apparently seized this opportunity to publically display a semblance of unity. Accordingly, most of the rebel leaders owing allegiance to this group, including G23 leader Mr Ghulam Nabi Azad, had been invited to the rally.
Some of the frontline leaders of the rebelling group such as former Haryana chief minister, Bhupinder Singh Hooda and the party’s deputy leader in Rajya Sabha Anand Sharma shared the dais with the Gandhis against whom they had raised questions. However, Mr Azad did not attend the rally for unknown reasons.
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