Will de facto CEO Rahul endanger Congress' grassroots story?

While this is neither surprising, nor a particularly shocking revelation, Rahul Gandhi’s quick rise in the echelons of his party might just be badly timed for the Congress. A report in The Indian Express states that the junior Gandhi has been officially handed over the reins to the entire party with his decision being deemed final in nominating candidates for the upcoming state polls. IE reports:

“He is also learnt to have started taking independent decisions like appointment of AICC office-bearers and constitution of state election campaign committees — like the last one for Rajasthan that ruled out Ashok Gehlot as the only chief ministerial candidate. Congress president Sonia Gandhi is said to be playing a “supervisory role” only, letting Rahul run most of party affairs.”

While Rahul Gandhi’s strictly moderate success in the poll circus up until now might hardly be an indicator of his managerial skills, the long expected but slightly abrupt development in his power equation with the party has the potential to muddle Congress’ election prospects. By sparking off internal discord, similar to that witnessed in the BJP not so long ago, Gandhi’s micro-managerial turn at this hour, leaves very little time for the disgruntled party cadres to nurse their wounds, cool off and get back into the poll fray just in time for the voting campaign to hit the acceleration button.

With the key state polls, including crucial ones for the Congress like Delhi and Rajasthan, all set to end this year, Rahul’s attempts to make the Congress party fall in line with his vision might have come after an unfortunate delay. The proof that his actions haven’t gone down well with sections of the Congress is evident from a recent incident where Congress MP Meenakshi Natarajan was locked up by dissenting party workers in Neemuch, Madhya Pradesh.

Apart from the fact that the change in leadership comes rather abruptly and somewhat insidiously, leaving the grassroots party cadres clueless, the younger Gandhi’s seeming hurry to uproot the time tested, established political traditions that the party has come to mould itself in over the years, has hit many discordant notes.

While Rahul has launched a drive to shake up the old benefactors of the party and redefine the expectations of the party from its workers and members, the most significant initiatives he has outlined for the party are ones that are not remotely inclusive. Nor do they address the concerns or priorities of large swathes of the party’s workers. Take for example Khidkee - a  social media initiative that petered out even before it fleshed itself out properly.

While a social networking site for the party workers, party supporters and curious fringe sitters is a good idea on paper, one has to understand that political debate watchers will shy away from joining a party-endorsed site. They would choose to battle it out on a more popular networking site like Twitter or Facebook which guarantees participation from a greater cross section of people.

And as for party workers, it can be safely said that just a sliver of the party’s support base will welcome an initiative like that. Data from 2012 shows that Internet penetration in India is limited to just 12.6 percent of the country’s population - obviously a tiny fraction of the population that can vote a party into power. In that context, his efforts run the risk of being interpreted as elitist, rich in board-room sophistication but lacking incisive grassroots reach.

Though not much is known about the fate of this endeavour, Rahul’s initiative to get aspiring poll candidates to fill in a form, on which their suitability to contest polls will be decided, also wasn’t received whole-heartedly. Again, while it seems like a theoretically encouraging move, the political history of India vouches for the fact that a candidate is not essentially elected on the basis of the credibility of his/her development plans or knowledge about his constituency.

Given that votes in India are influenced en masse  by the kind of connection a politician has been able to forge with his voters, the extent to which he/she has been able to percolate a dismissive electorate by dispatching active party cadres across the constituency and how successfully he/she has been able to advertise the opposition’s blunders, Rahul’s measures doesn’t take into account the theatrics involved in accumulating vote in India. Theatrics that are acquired and perfected only with time. His disregard for the same, understandably, has been fodder for impatience across several ranks of the party.

Finally, Rahul is indeed a late entrant into the party’s politics. He also carries the weight of a once popular perception that he was an unwilling participant in the country’s political discourse. While the sheer shock value of his public dismissal of the government’s legislation on convicted MPs and MLAs added a sheen to his otherwise unspectacular personality, denouncing the leaders that party workers have looked up to for longer than him, are bound to have its adverse effects. In fact, since it was the Prime Minister who bore the brunt of it, Gandhi has been serially panned for the immaturity of his move.

Finally, his lofty ambitions for the party and attempts to make sweeping changes within the Congress face one big hurdle - his own repertoire as a leader of the party. An exalted position inherited by the dint of belonging to the Congress’ first family and the refusal to take up any administrative role in the government as of yet, makes his efforts to reorganise the party’s priorities seem like an exercise of whim, that well thought-out political planning. And with the Opposition not leaving a chance to point that out, it won’t be long till the grassroots feel cheated by the power shift in the party headquarters. Congress then will be faced with a bigger adversary to fight than Narendra Modi  and it will be of its own making.