If the Bard were to contemplate penning a sonnet on the Indian National Congress, he would most likely not consider comparing it to a summer’s day. Another poet’s lines come to mind: No lark could sing with a sky so dark and grey. The news in the past few days has been quite devastating. There is an apparently unending procession of-what the stunned High Command would say: Rats from the sinking ship. Well, do be honest, many of the stalwarts fancied themselves as bandicoots with satraps of their own and amused audiences by trying to roar like a lion. Mice and men have been known to act strangely when pushed into a corner with their back against the wall. Congressmen, till they had not fallen from grace with the Dynasty, behaved not like rodents but fat cats or lapdogs.
Some who continue to be loyal courtiers would fault us for being in a haste to write a requiem for the what they insist on calling the GOP—quite oblivious of the fact that not a tattered shred of grandeur is there as a fig leaf and it’s a joke too call a family concern a political party. It hasn’t aged well. The wine has turned to vinegar long back. Now even Sonia Gandhi has decided to throw in the towel. Rather than face ignominious defeat in Raebareli she has opted for the safer route to Rajya Sabha via Rajasthan. The spin that is being put is that with Rahul representing Kerala, mom from Rajasthan and eternally hopeful sister defending the once-pocket burrow in Uttar Pradesh, the Congress would claim an all-India footprint.
Bad news is followed by worse tidings. ‘Kamal Nath and Son’ are keeping all in tenterhooks about their future course of action. In the interest of development of backward Chhindwara, in deference to the wishes of their beloved constituents, they will be constrained to join the BJP. How gullible they think public is and how short its memory? If Chhindwara is backward, who’s responsible? Funds may have dried up now but what about when Kamal Nath was the MP for successive terms, minister in the Centre and even CM of Madhya Pradesh.
For single-handedly delivering MP to BJP and hounding out Jyotiraditya Scindia from Congress, the man’s expectations for a suitable reward from NDA aren’t unnatural. Or, is the gentleman, once synonymous with ‘efficiency surcharge’, is worried about the midnight knock at his door? With his exit the number of ex-CMs from Congress will rise to 10 with the count on as the heat for the Lok Sabha election rises.
The Congress, we are reassured by die-hard loyalists, will rise from its ashes like the phoenix. When was the last time we witnessed the miracle? 1977? For those born after 1989, the Congress has looked more like an ostrich with its head buried in the sand or like the innocent Dodo who lent the coloniser more than a helping hand in its own extinction. There is no dearth of favourites of the family that strut the stage like peacocks till their ugly feet are exposed and frustrated they let loose a shower of quills like a porcupine at their benefactors.
All this is understandable. Politics is after all the game of patronage. With Congress out of power in most states, there is a great scarcity of the proverbial loaves and fishes. The struggle to secure a Rajya Sabha seat presents the gory sight of cockfights with razors tied to roosters’ legs. There are some survivors who never cease to surprise. Digvijaya Singh, for instance. Other ‘senior’ heavyweights from tiny states, like Anand Sharma, are grumbling at Abhishek Manu Singhvi being nominated from Himachal Pradesh. How easy does he forget that its been well settled by now that the children of the soil don’t have the first claim on RS seats. He himself had once entered the upper house from Rajasthan. Mallikarjun Kharge is constantly busy in damage control.
It may appear in bad taste to use phrases like ‘the last straw on the back of the camel’ or ‘nail in the wooden casket’, but how long can one remain in denial? Congress survives today only because the BJP needs it as a punching bag and to blame all ills and failures on the Nehru-Gandhi clan. Let’s be fair. Indira Gandhi had fought her own battles, won most of them and restored national pride to her compatriots. The decline began with Rajiv Gandhi—a good man undone by his school mates, flying colleagues and boyhood playmates. It’s almost four decades since he died. It’s only with Sonia and Rahul in the cockpit that irreversible decline set in. Well, flying on empty fuel tanks—not a drop of ideology or iota of inspirational vision—isn’t easy. The plane has finally nosedived. The best that the crew and the passengers can hope and pray for is a crash-landing without more damage than the wrecked aircraft.
Pushpesh Pant
Former professor, Jawaharlal Nehru University
pushpeshpant@gmail.com