What was the Congress ‘high command’ thinking when it decided to boycott the consecration ceremony in Ayodhya? How did this high command, which is a euphemism for the Gandhi family, spend two weeks mulling over the invitation they got and then arrive at a decision that harms the party more than anyone else? None of the reasons given for rejecting the invitation sent by the temple committee sound convincing. One reason offered by a Congress spokesperson on a chat show that I was part of, was that the decision signals a ‘return to Nehruvian secularism’.
A good reason but not plausible. It was Rajiv Gandhi who opened the locks to what was then the Babri Masjid and he organised his own consecration ceremony for a Ram Temple before the general election in 1989. What makes the ‘secularism’ argument less plausible still is that the man who is heir to this legacy spends so much time being videotaped in temples that he has faced the charge of subscribing to ‘soft’ Hindutva. His team, at one point, spread the word that he was a Brahmin who wore a ‘jeneu (sacred thread)’ signifying that he was a baptised Hindu. Seriously?
Another reason given is that the ceremony on January 22 is a ‘BJP-RSS show’. Perhaps. But how is it that the mighty Congress high command did not notice that by sending Sonia Gandhi or Mallikarjun Khadge to this show would allow Congress to share the political benefits that the BJP garners? Attending it would have worked for the Congress Party, not harmed it slightly. For me, personally, the boycott confirms that the people who lead our oldest political party have no idea of the mood of the voters. The temple in Ayodhya has come to be seen not just as a religious symbol but as a symbol of Indian unity and as a balm on a deep historical wound. Pilgrims have started flocking to Ayodhya in such huge numbers that Modi has appealed for people to celebrate instead in their own homes on the day of the consecration.
If our political leaders could find it in themselves to rise above petty politics, they would see that instead of polarising the country, the temple could become a symbol of healing and renewal. For this to happen, we need the Congress Party to stop sulking and the BJP to put an end to the sickening triumphalism that its more hysterical cadres continue to exhibit. We also need political leaders on the south side of the Vindhyas to accept that it is not a good idea to insult anyone’s faith, so calling the Sanatan Dharma a disease that needs to be eradicated is stupid and offensive.
These are things upon which voters will soon vote, but when the general election comes the Congress Party will find itself in as bad shape as it was in the last two elections. Ten years of sitting on the opposition benches has not helped the ‘high command’ discover that it is not another ‘yatra’ that is needed but a serious attempt to revive the grassroots appeal that this party once had. So strong was this appeal that for many decades opposition parties found it impossible to emerge from the long shadow that the Congress Party cast.
So, what went wrong? Why has the Congress Party been reduced to such a state that in the past two general elections it has not been able to win enough seats to claim the position of leader of the opposition in the Lok Sabha? Most political pundits blame Rahul Gandhi’s lack of leadership qualities for this, because under the leadership of his Mummy the party was dragged up from one of its lowest points to the heights of power. Sonia Gandhi did indeed achieve this remarkable feat, but she did something else for which the party is now paying a heavy price. She encouraged a Durbari culture in Delhi, so people who wanted to rise in the party had to come and kowtow in her court instead of doing hard political work in their own constituencies.
This weakened the roots of the party, because the men who knew how to kowtow best were those who came from political families and were in politics because of their surname not because of their public service. In villages and small towns that once had powerful local leaders with impressive records of public service, a new genre of grassroots leader emerged. This genre of political leader enters politics not with public service as his goal but money.
It is this culture of making money out of a political career that has done real harm to the Congress Party. It must change for a process of renewal to begin. But instead of getting on with this vital job, Rahul Gandhi seems more obsessed with building his own image. This is all that he will achieve with this new yatra. The last yatra he took did not leave in its wake strengthened grassroots party organisations and this one is unlikely to either. But if he was bent on wandering off again just before a general election, then he should have had the political sense to begin the yatra in Ayodhya so that he could have stolen some of Narendra Modi’s thunder. Why he did not do this is a mystery. What is clear is that the temple boycott is a big mistake.
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Rahul Gandhi should have had political sense to begin the yatra in Ayodhya so that he could have stolen some of Modi’s thunder
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14.01.2024
What was the Congress ‘high command’ thinking when it decided to boycott the consecration ceremony in Ayodhya? How did this high command, which is a euphemism for the Gandhi family, spend two weeks mulling over the invitation they got and then arrive at a decision that harms the party more than anyone else? None of the reasons given for rejecting the invitation sent by the temple committee sound convincing. One reason offered by a Congress spokesperson on a chat show that I was part of, was that the decision signals a ‘return to Nehruvian secularism’.
A good reason but not plausible. It was Rajiv Gandhi who opened the locks to what was then the Babri Masjid and he organised his own consecration ceremony for a Ram Temple before the general election in 1989. What makes the ‘secularism’ argument less plausible still is that the man who is heir to this legacy spends so much time being videotaped in temples that he has faced the charge of subscribing to ‘soft’ Hindutva. His team, at one point, spread the word that he was a Brahmin who wore a ‘jeneu (sacred thread)’ signifying that he was a baptised Hindu. Seriously?
Another reason given is that the ceremony on January 22 is a ‘BJP-RSS show’. Perhaps. But how is it that the mighty Congress high command did not notice that by sending Sonia Gandhi or Mallikarjun Khadge to this show would allow Congress to share the political benefits that the BJP........
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