Congress party has decided to train the party workers on “Nationalism” to stay relevant in ‘Nationalist’ India.
In a recent brainstorming session by Congress top brass, the leadership came with the idea to train the cadre on ‘nationalism’, ‘communication’ and ‘campaign’.
As per a report by Times of India, “Congress’s focus appears to be on a strategy to undo the political damage wrought by BJP’s success in inserting ‘nationalism’ in the popular discourse… As BJP continues to dictate the discourse, Congress appears to feel that it has to strengthen the confidence of its grassroots workers in its nationalist legacy.”
The Congress party does have a Nationalist legacy as it was the primary organization to be involved in Nation building. The party has been led by staunch Nationalist leaders till mid-1990s. But, after Sonia Gandhi took over the party leadership in mid-1998, the party realigned itself to the left to counter BJP.
Sonia Gandhi ended the alliance with Communist parties, which strive for a global alliance of human being instead of ‘National Interest’.
In 2004, she formed the United Progressive Alliance (UPA), an umbrella organization of Centre-left parties to bag the chair of PM for a Congress member.
After the UPA government came to power in 2004, Italian born Sonia Gandhi, who herself could not be Prime Minister, ‘placed’ Manmohan Singh on the prime minister’s chair while the real power was in the hands of specially constituted National Advisory Council (NAC), which was chaired by Mrs Gandhi.
The NAC, an advisory body set up by the UPA government to advise the Prime Minister of India ran a shadow government in the country. The NAC was the brainchild of erstwhile Sonia Gandhi who used the NAC to supersede the decisions taken by Manmohan Singh’s Cabinet. In a nasty show of power and connivance, the NAC rendered Manmohan Singh and the Cabinet powerless.
NAC was filled with anti-National activists like Deep Joshi, Farah Naqvi, Mirai Chatterjee, Virginius Xaxa. The advocates of extreme leftist policies- Harsh Mander, Jean Dreze were also a member of NAC.
Under the leadership of Sonia Gandhi, the Congress party took a leftward turn.
The ‘Nationalist’ leaders of Congress party were sidelined and the power was placed in the hands of non-elected activist type people.
The ‘elitist’ and ‘feudal’ leaders of the Congress have failed to recognize the increasing belief of ‘New India’ in meritocracy performance-based competitive politics.
The top brass of the party is filled with semi-feudal leaders and therefore it is often dubbed as ‘semi-feudal party’. If the Congress party does not choose to ‘realign’ itself on the ideological spectrum, soon the party will die.
Even the common Congress members feel that the party is hell-bent on making itself irrelevant in emerging nationalist India. The official stand of the party on important national issues is not in sync with that of the general populace.
The abolition of Article 370 is not the only issue where Congress has opposed the general sentiment of the people of India. The party chose not to stand with the majority opinion on Triple Talaq Bill; it also expressed doubts over Balakot airstrike by Modi government.
The official stand of the party on ideological issues has ensured that it will not come back to power for another few decades. The new emerging India wants non-dynastic, corruption-free, nationalist government. A government which could make the people safe, secure, and enable them to become prosperous. The Congress party has failed to stand for these principles.
From 2004 to 2014, when the Congress was in power under the UPA umbrella, the party failed to provide the aforementioned type of government.
Instead, the party chose to do politics of entitlement with the series of ‘Right’ bills. The Right to Food, Right to Education, Right to Land, Right to Information, all these bills were Congress’s compensation for not being able to enforce a rule-based transparent capitalist system. The party chose to ‘appease’ different constituencies through these bills and ensured that it gets their votes.
The agenda worked for the first 5 years as the UPA government was reaping the benefits of policies implemented by the Vajpayee government. But in the next five years, every loophole in the Congress model busted and the corruption, terrorism, unpopularity, economic decline prevailed. The second term of UPA government was so unpopular that the party was reduced to merely 44 seats in the 2014 general election.
Finally, the Congress party has understood that a party could not survive without in India with having a staunch Nationalist ideological position. The training of the party cadre on Nationalism could help the party in reestablishing itself on the ideological spectrum.
