The time has come for the grand old party – Congress to start from the scratch if it wants to remain a viable political party in India.
The virtual washout in the recent hustings should make the leadership accept it is “now or never”.
The party with a history which no other party in India can boast of including gaining India its freedom is today facing humiliating political defeats every where it contests and is being rejected by the people in state after state.
The writing on the wall is clear: The Congress is no more in the race.
A party which ruled at the Centre for more than 54 years has come to this sorry pass because it just did not move with the time while rival political parties slowly took over its ground.
One of the key factors in the Congress Party is the “Gandhi Parivar”.
There is no gainsaying that it is the charisma of the Gandhis whether it be Nehru, Indira Gandhi, Rajiv Gandhi which played a significant role in making Congress the formidable force it became throughout the length and breadth of the country.
The Gandhis even today Sonia Gandhi, Rahul Gandhi, Priyanka Gandhi are perhaps the most recognized and charismatic faces of the party.
The fact that the party has been doing poorly in elections since the past many years has several reasons and the blame cannot be heaped completely on the Gandhis who hold the helm of the party.
Dynastic politics
It is one thing for the opposition to rightly rail against the “dynastic” politics of Congress party but it also true that till date it has been the Gandhi family which has willy nilly been able to hold the disparate, disgruntled, rebellious, Congress leaders united and under one fold.
The young scion of the family in charge of the party are finding it difficult to win against mammoth force of the Bharatiya Janata Party which has over the last several decades slowly but surely taken over much of what used to be one time Congress’s own constituency.
There are several reasons as to why Congress in the long run has lost its game to BJP. One of the main reason BJP played on the perceived grievances of the majority community and became their spokesperson even before Congress could realise that the ground had slipped under it.
The BJP was able to make its charge “pseudo secularism” against the Congress stick at least in the minds of the public.
Once Congress gave way , it was very easy for the BJP to virtually replace Congress.
Congress was not able to move fast to plug any loopholes in its strategy. It just kept watching as there continued to be massive exodus of its leaders year on year.
BJP always remains in election mode
A cadre based party with a strong hard working and charismatic leader like Modi was too much of a match for Congress leaders.
The BJP seemed to be always in the “election mode” with an extremely well oiled party election machinery till the booth level ready to be activated on the word go.
A complete contrast was the Congress looking towards the “High Command” in Delhi before taking any important decision. Besides sycophancy one of the greatest bane of the Congress has been that power have not been delegated at different levels or even if they have, junior functionaries are fearlful of taking decision on their own.
The recent virtual wipe out of the Congress has led a vociferous voice within the Congress that there is need for drastic changes an eupheism for change in the leadership of Gandhis.
Already two voices are being heard , pro Gandhi and anti Gandhi.
As a Congress leader said that a party cannot be run if one kept changing leadership after every defeat.
But that is not to say accountability need not be fixed even if the blame falls on the entire collective leadership. Time seems to be running out for Congress and even if any hard measures are to be taken to save the party it must be taken now.
It will not be a loss for Congress or Gandhis but for the whole country if a party like Congress withers away.
| Posted by Sameer Khan | 
