Why can't Sonia Gandhi put a stop to sycophancy?

The culture of sycophancy and servility has always been part of the Congress DNA. Even senior leaders have to occasionally recite the oath of loyalty to assure the high command that they are still on the leash. They need to acknowledge the omnipotence of the Gandhi family at regular intervals. While no party is immune to the culture of sycophancy — it’s a national trait and is essentially linked to how leaders come up the political ladder — in case of the Congress it is too pronounced. What was the pressing need for Ram Naresh Yadav to express gratitude to Congress president Sonia Gandhi for his appointment as the governor of Madhya Pradesh? According to media sources, addressing a meeting in Uttar Pradesh, Yadav showered praise on Sonia Gandhi, saying it would not have been possible for a petty party worker like him to be governor had Sonia Gandhi not advised President Pratibha Devisingh Patil to appoint him to the position. [caption id=“attachment_107803” align=“alignleft” width=“380” caption=“The culture of sycophancy and servility has always been part of the Congress DNA. B Mathur/Reuters”]  [/caption] It’s not clear why the People’s Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL) should make such a fuss about the statement – Rajeev Yadav, the state general secretary of the rights organisation, plans to meet President Pratibha Patil over the issue – and demand his removal even when the BJP in the state is not interested but the statement serves to highlight the deficiencies in the leadership structure of the Congress. Put to some malicious interpretation, it means Congress leaders become top functionaries in states only because of the blessings of the high command and not because of their abilities. Also, it could mean that petty party workers can rise up the ladder and finally to important positions only by being in the good books of the high command. The equation between the top leadership and lower leadership in the Congress remains entirely skewed in favour of the former. That the Congress is a spent force in many of the states and is incapable of finding leaders to revive the party even in its erstwhile strongholds is a direct consequence of this unequal equation. When loyalty is the criteria for personal political growth, there has to be compromises on capability. How this system of loyalty works? Well, at the lower levels the organisation – it applies to all parties — is made up of several groups. The party worker has to stay loyal to the leader of the dominant group or shift allegiance to him strategically at some stage. His growth in the ranks is dependent on his extent of loyalty to the leader. At a latter and higher stage, the network of loyalties expands. The reward comes in the form of a party seat in elections or some important position in the party. There’s virtually no scope for the independent-minded individual, no matter how talented he is, to grow on his own in isolation in a party set-up. Thus the leaders are programmed to be loyal – sycophancy is an extension of it — in the grooming stages. It becomes a habit later on. The Congress leaders, at least most in the older generation, fail to get out of that habit. Professing loyalty to the Gandhi family is one important aspect of it. There’s no denying the centrality of the Gandhi family in Congress’ scheme of things. It serves as a binding force – a rallying point rather – for so many disparate forces in the umbrella organisation with specific ideology. That the party would collapse under the competing ambitions of different senior leaders without that binding force is known. But the public expression of loyalty and servileness among the leaders is confounding. Down South, leaders of a few parties are known to prostrate at the feet of their supreme leaders to express their absolute submission. In these cases, the leaders are known to encourage the practice. In other parties it works in less visible ways. But nowhere it comes out as clearly as in the Congress – to be fair to it not many in the new generation are into it though. But why cannot the high command say just stop this nonsense, it is embarrassing? It does not do the public perception of the party any good.