NEW DELHI: Faced with a stark future, even an existential crisis of sorts, the Congress and its sympathisers are desperately seeking a revival plan. Without a discernible blue-print, Congress chief Sonia Gandhi has been inundated with ‘how-to’ recommendations, as letters, SMSs, notes and a few reports, solicited, and unsolicited.
One such startling note has been shot off by Madhusudan Mistry, an AICC general secretary, asking for the 'dismantling of AICC'. Blamed for much that went wrong in the 2014 elections, Mistry is the man in the eye of the storm. Congress insiders, hoi polloi and the upper echelons included see in Mistry, the manifestation of all the ills that crept into the party between 2009 and 2014.
More than his general secretary post, Mistry's position in the party is best understood by his proximity to 12 Tugluq Lane, Rahul Gandhi's office. For some reason, leaders claim, he caught “the party Vice President’s fancy”, that in the current Congress translates into backing to tinker with the party edifice. So Mistry is at work. Leaping over A K Antony ( many Antony reports are ‘not implemented’) mandated to analyse the party's humiliating defeat and suggest ‘corrective measures’, he has admittedly sent “a note” to Congress president, prescribing: “Do away with the AICC secretariat.” He has urged the Congress high command to affect a complete overhaul, ‘systematic change’. The reason—the people manning the various offices/departments at AICC, 24 Akbar Road, have “fossils” who “only work towards saving their own chair and not the party”.
Under fire from all sides, particularly the UP-wallhas in the Congress like former ministers Salman Khurshid and Beni Prasad Verma who openly challenged his authority to question them about the defeat, Mistry shifts the heat on the party’s leadership, Sonia and Rahul Gandhi. To get Mistry out of UP, an alternative plan has been floated to divide the state into four Pradesh Congress units with separate PCC chiefs and AICC in charges. “How is the leadership responsible for the worst performance? They are the only candidates who could retain their seats in UP (Rae Bareli and Amethi). Why did senior ministers (Khurshid and Verma) lose their deposits?'' says a source.
Citing the starling performance put by the Modi camp, Mistry aide compares how Narendra Modi did not have to bother about (Lok Sabha) seats in Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan or Chhattisgarh, “his campaign only added a few more seats to the BJP kitty”; “Shivraj Singh Chouhan, Vasundhara Raje and Raman Singh took care of their states”, but the Congress CMs “failed miserably—how is it the leadership’s fault?”
Mistry’s note also took pot-shots at the AICC publicity cell and media department for not supplying with timely useable material-the quick responses-that could turn around the perceptional problems faced by the party on the electoral battle ground. Digvijaya Singh, incidentally, was heading the publicity wing with Jairam Ramesh as the key factor; and Ajay Maken helmed the media AICC cell. Mistry finds fault with both.
Cornered, Mistry is “collectively blaming the party leadership for what happened” for the low that deprives the party of a leader of Opposition position in the Lok Sabha. He himself was in charge of candidate selection, UP, Vadodara, Gujarat strategy and had to also become a Rajya Sabha MP within the same period. It was a large role. But Mistry claims he had the guts to take on Modi in Vadodara “when all others refused”. It’s not the much-reported poll-vault he did to put his own posters over Modi’s, that he is proud of, but the number of votes he polled — 2,75336. It is another matter, he lost by 570128 votes!
Counters to Mistry are many. Angry Congress men, point to “laughable” poll antics and his margin of loss. “Did he forget that he was representing the Congress and is a general secretary when he climbed lamp posts?” But, their biggest grouse is that he chaired the Central Election Committee and experimented with candidate selection. With Rahul’s blessings, Mistry may be allowed to repeat his experiments in Haryana, Maharashtra and Jharkhand.