The Congress not Ready for Rahul Gandi as President

NEW DELHI: Congress scion Rahul Gandhi will be returning after 55 days to address the Kisan rally being organised by the party. He will sound the bugle---or so seems to be the perception---for the revival of the Congress under his rejuvenated leadership on April 19.

Unfortunately no one in or outside the party is untowardly excited. There is curiosity of course, but arising more from the reasons for the long disappearance, than new found faith in Rahul Gandhi’s leadership abilities. And as Congressmen point out even before journalists notice it, no one really wants to hand over the reins of the party to him at this stage.

If there is a vote within the Congress as to who should be---or remain---the President of the party, it will go to Sonia Gandhi hands down. Ironically, Rahul Gandhi will only be the party’s choice if his mother officially hands over the baton to him as a fait accompli. And that is a decision she has been wanting to take for at least a couple of years now, but election defeats and others controversies have prevented her from doing so.

The party is as curious as the scribe about the real reasons for the scion’s disappearance. All agree that the government would be in the know and wonder why there has been no ‘leak’ on this so far. In fact several friendly opposition MP’s have also been speculating about the government silence and as a senior West Bengal politician said, “we can understand the Congress silence but not the BJP’ government’s silence.”

Interestingly, while those supposedly supporting the move to place Rahul Gandhi as the party president remain silent, there are many who have opposed it by declaring their faith in Sonia Gandhi’s leadership. The list includes Veerappa Moily, Amarinder Singh, Ambika Soni and Sandeep Dishit. Others like Sachin Pilot initially said the same, but then claimed they had been misquoted. The Kerala PCC for instance passed a resolution blaming the Lok Sabha defeat on him, but then amended this.

Congress chief minister of Assam, Karnataka, Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand and Kerala have not come out in support of Rahul Gandhi as party president. Clearly there is a reluctance within the party, with the occasional and almost desperate “we want Priyanka Gandhi’ being the only cry heard every now and again from the rank and file. This has been silenced by stern admonishment by the top leaders, with the party now unequivocally supporting the status quo.

Rahul Gandhi’s return thus, is going to be uneventful for the Congress party per se. His supporters within remain restricted to Jairam Ramesh who is organising the rally, CP Joshi and a couple of others. A great deal will depend on his first challenge: that is performance in Parliament as the party prepares to combat the Land Acquisition Bill and turn the agrarian crisis to its advantage.

The second challenge of course, will be the Bihar Assembly elections although the Congress is unlikely to use this as a revival strategy. At least there is no indication of this at the moment.

The reasons for Rahul Gandhi’s long absence from politics are many, running from the more charitable “he needs a holiday” to the downright cynical “rehabilitation.” As a Congress leader said , no one will ever know where he went and why he went just like we have no real information whether Sonia Gandhi is very ill, and if so, what is she suffering from?

The ways of the top dynastic family remain secretive, with decisions taken by friends, family and a handful of politicians who have access at any given point in time. The decisions are then communicated to the rest, as was the case in 2004 when the family took the decision that Sonia Gandhi would not be the Prime Minister, then informed the close political leaders, and then came out to tell the waiting media and the rest of the world.