WHAT’S WRONG WITH THE CONGRESS?
CONSIDER this. Of the 303 BJP MPs in the current Lok Sabha, at least 31 are former Congress members. Between 2015 and 2020, some 120 elected Congress MLAs have switched sides to the BJP. The Modi tsunami in 2014 reduced the party to its lowest-ever tally of 44; a performance it improved only marginally by eight seats in 2019. Of the three heartland states it won in 2018, Madhya Pradesh has slipped out of its hands along with Jyotiraditya Scindia, Rajasthan and Sachin Pilot are hovering around the exit door. In 2019, the party was unable to prevent 13 of its MLAs in Karnataka from resigning and bringing down the Congress-Janata Dal (Secular) government. In the 2017 assembly elections for Goa and Manipur, despite emerging as the single-largest party in both states, the sloth and indecisiveness of the party command structure saw rival BJP snatch victory from the jaws of defeat. The mahagathbandhan in Bihar, which comprehensively won the 2015 assembly election, now lies in tatters, with Nitish Kumar firmly entrenched in the BJP camp. In the five states that account for the highest number of seats in the 543-member Lok Sabha—Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, West Bengal, Bihar and Tamil Nadu—the Congress won only 12 of their combined 249 seats. Of the 1,462 assembly seats in the five states, the Congress occupies only 130. The party does not have a single MLA in Andhra Pradesh, Delhi, Tripura, Sikkim and Nagaland.
Yet, the grand old party lumbers on, as though in a stupor. It took a Sharad Pawar to goad it into supporting Uddhav Thackeray in Maharashtra; it is taking all of Ashok Gehlot’s political acumen to save the Congress government in Rajasthan. The party finds itself in a curious bind: it cannot look beyond the Gandhis for leadership, and they in turn are unable to provide that leadership. The central command of the party is caught in a tug of war between Sonia Gandhi’s old guard and Team Rahul’s young turks. With little intervention from the high command, state units have become fiefdoms of regional satraps, or are in disarray where there are no
