Corona lockdown brings out Congress factionalism
Party leaders are divided on targeting the government over its response to the pandemic.
In what reminds one of Congress being on a sticky wicket over the Rafale issue, the principal opposition party has once again landed in an embarrassing situation, with the leaders divided over targeting the government over its response to the pandemic resulting from coronavirus. The lack of coordination among strategists of the party is what has come to the fore. This is exactly how the Congress used to be divided while cornering the government over Rafale in 2018-19.
That time, Rahul Gandhi and other leaders were at variance with each other on this issue. The Congress was divided in two groups then. However, the party this time is split into three groups over the corona issue.
Old guards loyal to interim Congress President Sonia Gandhi form one group, while the young Turks with their own ambitions led by Rahul Gandhi are in the second group. AICC general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra is the third power centre. All these three sections are singing their own tunes over the issue of corona. Sonia Gandhi gives statements while ensuring that it dovetails into the strategy of old guards. Rahul Gandhi has his own opinion to make. Meanwhile, Priyanka Vadra has her own points of view in attacking both the Narendra Modi and Yogi dispensations. She has spared no efforts in launching vitriolic attacks on both leaders.
In other words, all the three top Congress leaders have been vying with each other to earn brownie points on the government’s response to the corona crisis. It was at the instructions of Sonia Gandhi that some veterans attacked the government through videos. But what has set the tongues wagging is the emergence of three power centres within the Congress. That Rahul Gandhi is in offensive mode suggests his desire to return as head of the Congress
once again. That’s the reason why Sonia Gandhi didn’t make major changes in the organisation, albeit such a decision had its own negative repercussions, like Madhya Pradesh going out of Congress hands. Rahul Gandhi had an upper hand in most of the appointments. Sonia Gandhi has been focusing on ensuring coordination between old guards and younger generation leaders. But her efforts haven’t got the desired results. States like Maharashtra, Rajasthan and Punjab where the Congress is in power are witnessing intraparty politics and faction fighting. Others states are no different.
What these fights have exposed is the faulty strategy to take on the government over the corona crisis handling. Congress seniors are not making open statements about the corona crisis. When Rahul Gandhi questioned the lockdown, veteran leader Ghulam Nabi Azad in Rajya Sabha supported this move of the government. Even Congress Chief Ministers have backed the lockdown decision. In addition to this, Rahul Gandhi’s decision to interact with the migrants didn’t also go down well with many in the Congress. Meanwhile, Priyanka Vadra jumped on to the bandwagon of corona politics and in the process emerged a different power centre leading to confusion among the rank and file of the Congress. She tried to focus more on what is related to the politics of Uttar Pradesh. What surprised the Congress leaders more was that the Gandhis became the party in themselves and started furthering their agenda regardless of much-needed coordination. Rahul Gandhi’s stand visa-vis Rafale, Balakot strike, etc had also in the same way taken the leaders aback, with many of them having chosen to be silent on these issues then. There’s no denying how dearly Rahul Gandhi’s stand cost the Congress.
Rahul Gandhi is being projected as the future president of the Congress, which he would of course be. He would have been reinstalled as Congress boss if the corona crisis had not broken out. Meanwhile, young leaders have become active to get Rahul Gandhi reappointed as Congress chief because their own ambitions have to be fulfilled with this development. The most soughtafter job is that of political secretary of the Congress president. Media cell head Randeep Singh Surjewala is eyeing this post because he has been quite vocal with Rahul Gandhi during Rafale and the corona protests.
Similarly, the media head post has also led to lobbying in the Congress. Manish Tiwari was being considered to be the frontrunner. But now heavyweight P. Chidambaram is backing Supriya Shrinet, whom he had got appointed spokesperson some time back.
Chidambaram wants her to be media cell head on the plea that in future, politics will be dominated by economic issues; so an economic expert needs to be at the helm of the media department of the AICC. Supriya was a business journalist before joining Congress. The party veterans are preferring to be silent spectator to this kind of intra-party politics.