How Sonia took on Modi, AAP to try win back Delhi for Congress

It was meant to be a show of strength for the Congress party, especially since party president Sonia Gandhi was herself sharing the dais with top Delhi Congress leaders. At Sunday’s Delhi rally, one thing was clear – Sonia puts tradition over power as the Congress makes an attempt to maintain “Ganga Jamuni Tehzeeb” or its cultural ethos. [caption id=“attachment_1457909” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] AFP[/caption] At the rally venue in north west Delhi, with Sheila Dikshit cooling her heels in Kerala as Governor, the show belonged to Union minister Ajay Maken, Delhi Congress chief Arvinder Singh Lovely and Congress Legislature Party leader in the Delhi Assembly, Haroon Yusuf. It was perhaps the first big rally in Delhi in two decades where three-time CM Sheila was missing. Even though the Congress has lost major ground to AAP in Delhi, Sonia trained her guns first on the BJP, especially on Narendra Modi. She spoke about Dr Hakim Ajmal Khan, the Congress leader after whom the rally ground is named, and about “Ganga Jamuni Tehzeeb”. The age old tradition of Hindu-Muslim unity still exists but only in one political party, the Congress, she stressed. “It was a good rally, the crowd was beyond our expectation. There were double the people outside the ground than inside,” said Shakil Ahmad, General Secretary, Delhi Congress. “The contest in Delhi is between Congress and BJP.” She termed the 2014 general elections as a battle of ideologies. Training her guns on BJP’s Prime Ministerial candidate Narendra Modi, Sonia castigated him for personal ambition. “Power is a tool to do good for the people. “It is all about intention (neeyat) and that is where the difference lies," she said. “Some people want to mislead you and come to power to form a government that will be run by a handful of select men,” she added. Just when one thought that her whole attention during the speech was on the BJP, she took on AAP too. “Running a government is not child’s play. Some tried to run it, instead they ran away themselves.” The location of the rally was also to prove that very point. North West Delhi is the lone reserved seat in Delhi, where a sizeable chunk of the voters work on daily wages. Sonia pointed out the good work done by the UPA in bringing the Manual Scavenging Prohibition Bill, Street Vendors Bill for protection of livelihood and doing their best for “Safai Karamcharis” or sweepers. “There was no rhetoric in her speech. No mention of the usual flyovers and metro that we hear in all Congress speeches,” said a senior Congress aide. He added, “By mentioning Delhi-specific Bills like the anti-scavenging and street vendor laws brought by UPA, who was she addressing?” She was making it clear that the party has not yet given up hopes of the lower classes coming back to their fold. The latest internal report circulating in the Delhi Congress is that the party is still in with a chance if they can keep the lower classes and urban poor with them. The party high command is anxious to win back this crucial vote if they are to stay relevant in Delhi’s political scenario. “AAP has used Delhi as a springboard for promoting their national politics. Instead of accepting their faults, they are blaming others for leaving Delhi without a stable Government,” said Shakil Ahmed. “The Dalit factor will work in our favour,” he added. But the real worry for the Congress is the Muslim vote that has been rock solid behind the party until now. It was one of the main reasons why Sheila Dikshit swept to power three times in a row from 1998-2013. The Dalit Muslim Brahmin combine was too good to be broken by BJP. But the emergence of AAP has seen the Dalit vote flock to Arvind Kejriwal’s broom. The Congress realizes that they are in trouble if Muslims decide in favour of some tactical voting to defeat the BJP. MP Sandeep Dikshit admitted, “It is a challenging situation for us. The false propaganda of other parties has hurt us the most.” Taking a dig at AAP, he said, “It’s very easy to oppose, but it’s a hard task to do good work for the people. We will highlight the achievements of Delhi and UPA Governments to counter the politics of opposing and propaganda.” If AAP can manage to swing the public mood in its favour again, the Muslims will prefer siding with the party who will fight the BJP. Such a scenario can hurt the Congress most in Chandni Chowk, North East and East Delhi seats. That explains why Sonia didn’t forget to mention the Sachar Committee and Sixth Pay Commission. So the party seems to have finally decided to take on the BJP and AAP through their same tools of hype and propaganda. Though she did get stuck on the word “khushhaal” during her speech and managed to even smile at the fumble, perhaps she was hoping that the term would apply more to her party in coming times than to other political parties.