After the polling for the Lok Sabha elections came to an end, various media organizations had taken out exit polls, gauging the public attitude. According to the poll of exit polls by NDTV, 302 seats are going to BJP led NDA, 122 to Congress-led UPA and 119 seats to the other regional parties. The citizens are widely anticipating an NDA victory and at the same time, they have started looking into the opposition parties with a special focus on Congress, trying to understand the causes of such a disastrous exit poll result. Out of the entire political campaign filled with blunders, a few steps taken by the grand old party are being viewed as particularly miscalculated.
At the top of the list of blunders lies the NYAY scheme. That was Congress’ second most powerful weapon in the field of campaigning, the first being the induction of the fabled daughter. The NYAY scheme promised to provide Rs 72,000 annually to the poorest 20 percent of Indians, or about five crore families. The scheme was essentially being viewed an electoral gimmick that would give the Congress the support of the masses in the country, the lower class in particular, which happens to be the biggest vote bank in the country. However, the scheme has majorly backfired.
First of all, the scheme was communicated in a very haphazard manner. There was a lot of confusion in the announcement of the scheme, with Rahul Gandhi and Congress spokesperson Randeep Surjewala stating different things. This discrepancy in the scheme benefits lost the Congress the bit of trust they could have garnered and had to start off at a sorry note. Moreover, the way the scheme was communicated to the masses was extremely absurd. It was regularly iterated using English media channels, English newspapers, social media, and interviews. The scheme was for the poor and yet much effort had been taken and resources had been spent by the Congress, trying to communicate it to the affluent. It seemed as though the Lutyens in Delhi had devised the scheme and marketed it amongst themselves only.
Eventually, when the scheme finally did reach the intended masses, it wasn’t accepted by them and they saw it for what it is, an electoral gimmick aimed at countering the popularity of the BJP government. Congress has made many such grand gestures in the past which sounds attractive on paper but lacks implementation, the most popular of those being the “Garibi Hatao” slogan, which not only won Indira Gandhi her elections but also reaped benefits for her son, Rajiv Gandhi. Needless to say, it’s been 50 years since the Congress started chanting “Garibi Hatao” and poverty still persists as one of the biggest issues in India, essentially proving that it is a family tradition of the Congress leaders to use the poor for their political ambitions. The people only wonder what Rahul Gandhi will achieve through this NYAY that his ancestors couldn’t, through “Garibi Hatao”.
NYAY’s take-off was sabotaged by some of the contradictory statements regarding its purpose, operationalization and funds by Congress leaders. One such leading voice on NYAY was Rahul Gandhi’s guru, Sam Pitroda. Pitroda declared that the middle class will have to shell out capital for the NYAY scheme as the taxes on their hard earned income will increase, which they obviously will not appreciate.
Speaking of Sam Pitroda, he is the one leader who hasn’t left any stone unturned in his efforts to malign the name of the Congress. Apart from his insensitivity towards the middle classes by asking them not to be “selfish” in the event of a tax hike to accommodate the NYAY scheme, he has also made highly inconsiderate remarks on the 1984 riots when the Sikhs were massacred. On the massacre Pitroda had said, 1984 mein Hua toh Hua (it happened in 1984, so what?), for which he was sent a notice by the National Commission for Minorities. Pitroda’s insensitivity isn’t solely limited to the Sikh community. After the Balakot air strikes, he had disrespected the armed forces by stating that the attacks happen all the time and sending planes isn’t the right approach to deal with them. He has also said that Pakistan isn’t accountable for this and the blame lies on a few people. Such remarks of Sam Pitroda have obviously had irrevocable effects on Rahul Gandhi’s electoral ambitions.
Regardless of the guru, Rahul Gandhi’s own attacks against PM Modi have been one of the biggest causes to his electoral demise. His entire campaign is based on the slogan, “Chowkidar Chor Hai”, aiming to get people to vote for Congress, not because the party is worthy of the same but because the alternate is involved in corruption. This has royally backfired for the party as, after getting clean chits from both the apex authorities in the country, the Supreme Court and the CAG, BJP led by PM Modi is being viewed as honest by the public. Rahul Gandhi turned further desperate after this, as proving corruption in the Rafale deal was supposed to be his only leverage in the Lok Sabha elections. Thereafter, in spite of the clean chits, he set out to set the public narrative of PM Modi’s corruption and hence the extremely vocal “Chowkidar Chor Hai” jibes were seen during the entire election period. His attempt to “shatter Modi’s clean image” using the Rafale deal has turned out to be against him as the public was clear on PM Modi’s integrity and honest intentions. Not limited to public resentment, the Gandhi scion’s jibes have gotten him involved in legal matters as well; after he attributed the “Chowkidar Chor hai” slogan to the Supreme Court stating the apex court has agreed to the statement. The slogan again attracted legal trouble for the party when the members made children shout out the jibe. Although to be fair, it was his sister Priyanka Gandhi Vadra who was responsible for this.
Priyanka Gandhi Vadra is the 4th and perhaps one of the biggest blunders contributing in Congress’ inevitable wipe out. She had been inducted at time when it was being envisaged that this generation of the Nehru-Gandhi clan would not produce a Prime Minister and thus she was being viewed as the ‘golden savior’ by the party. However, 4 months later, it is unclear as to her motive for joining the party, whether it was to reap political benefits in UP or to simply hand over the state to the SP-BSP alliance; an alliance, which hadn’t included Congress, in spite of Priyanka’s ‘fabled charms’. Her campaigning tactics, ranging from abusive videos involving children, ad hominem attacks against BJP leaders, faking respect for the erstwhile Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri and finally, admitting her party’s relevance is limited to cutting BJP’s vote share have received much criticism. Failing at literally every aspect of the election, the Congress sensed another defeat and thus did not field her from Varanasi, limiting Priyanka’s presence to mere emotional support, for lack of other roles.
Apart from these, there have been several other factors to the Congress’ apparent shameful performance, if exit poll results are any indication, but these 4 are the main blunders. Rahul Gandhi has been aided by 3 other elements, to share the blame equally amongst themselves. It would do well to the grand old party if they looked into their own faults and shortcomings, instead of blaming opposition propaganda or unbiased institutions such as the Election Commission.