12/4/2016

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Congress losing out to BJP

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The Congress Party faces the challenging task of going beyond dynastic politics and providing
the Indian people with an alternative. Photo: AP

Kuldip Nayar

I wish I could agree with Congress president Sonia Gandhi that compassion was
the distinctive character of her mother-in-law, Mrs. Indira Gandhi. A person with
an iota of consideration for individual freedom would not have detained 100,000
people without trial as she did during the Emergency in 1975. Not only that, she
also gagged the press and moulded the society in such a way that it had no
hesitation to cross the thin line between right and wrong, moral and immoral.
True, Indira Gandhi did help the people of the then East Pakistan in their
struggle to free themselves from the distant Rawalpindi and the atrocities which
the army committed against the Bangladeshis. Sonia Gandhi states in a television
interview with Rajdeep Sardesai that the then Prime Minister would tell them at
the dining table how the Punjabi army was killing the people in Bangladesh
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intentionally, without remorse.

The liberation of Bangladesh was probably her finest hour and the opposition
leader Atal Behari Vajpayee hailed her as Goddess Durga for having divided
Pakistan. This obviated the danger of attack on India from the eastern side.
However, the fact remains that the Partition formula which recognised the two
parts of Pakistan, East and West, was not followed.
Pakistan never forgave India for the separation, although the Hamoodur Rahman
Commission report on the Bangladesh War blames people in West Pakistan for
treating Bangladeshis as second class citizens. This may be the real reason why
they rose against Rawalpindi and freed themselves from its clutches.
During the birth centenary of Mrs. Gandhi, which is being currently celebrated,
two things will be remembered, one commendable and another condemnable. The
first relates to the liberation of Bangladesh and the second is connected with the
Emergency.
As was probably agreed to before the interview, Rajdeep does not ask Sonia
Gandhi any question about the Emergency. Once he tries to bring in Sanjay
Gandhi but she corrects him that the interview was about Indira Gandhi. Sonia
Gandhi refuses to compare Prime Minister Narendra Modi with Indira Gandhi. She
merely says that they were two different people. She refuses to elucidate, even
though Rajdeep repeats the question.
At one time, I too was on personal terms with Mrs. Gandhi. I met her when the
then Home Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri was a member of the Citizens Committee
which Jawaharlal Nehru had constituted under her to reinvigorate the people
who felt dejected after the debacle against China in 1962. Although I was a mere
information officer, she had no qualms about treating people at par.
Despite our good relations, she had no compunction in detaining me during the
Emergency. We never met after the detention, although there were feelers from
her side expressing her desire to meet me. I was too bitter to entertain the idea.
It was said about her that she was the only 'man' in the cabinet. She was
assertive and clear in the orders she gave. The Emergency, however, was thrust
upon her by Sanjay Gandhi and his cohort Siddhartha Shankar Ray, then West
Bengal Chief Minister. She too probably realised that it was her only chance to
wriggle herself out of the Allahabad High Court verdict which had unseated her.
Indeed, it was a hard punishment for a poll indiscretion.
But it was a judgment which had to be respected. She not only suspended the
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Constitution to do away with the judgment, but also introduced authoritarianism

which was not a part of the democratic governance. The entire Parliament caved
in and the members, because of fear, endorsed the Emergency without a
whimper. They, otherwise, would criticise in private what she did.
Most pathetic was the role of the media. I recall that when the Emergency was
imposed, there was anger and more than a hundred journalists assembled at the
Press Club at my bidding to condemn her act. But when I tried to pick up the
threat after my detention for three months, there was hardly anyone to come in
my support. Mrs. Gandhi had created so much fear in the minds of journalists
that they were more worried about their jobs than the concept of the freedom of
the press, which they otherwise cherished.
The problem with the Congress Party today is that it has not gone beyond the
dynastic dependence. And, somehow, people are not enamoured by the dynasty
anymore. Rahul Gandhi doesn't sell, although he passionately and honestly
pursues the Congress principles laid down by his great grandfather Nehru.
Priyanka, Sonia Gandhi's daughter, goes down well with the masses. This is
probably because she reminds them of Indira Gandhi, who still enjoys preeminence in their thoughts.
All this is true, and yet the Congress has lost its relevance and the party has to
work hard to make people believe that it can provide an alternative. Prime
Minister Modi is still acceptable, in spite of steps like the demonetisation of
currency. The public believe that it was all for their good even though they have
to face inconvenience.
It is a long haul for the Congress to push the BJP out of power. The biggest
problem is that secularism is not as attractive a concept as it once used to be.
The public themselves have been influenced by Hindutva thoughts. In fact, there
is a soft Hindutva in the country today. How to resell the idea of India, that is a
democratic and secular polity, is the arduous task which the Congress is facing
today.
That is probably the reason why Sonia Gandhi talked in terms of compassion
when she gave the interview at the Anand Bhavan in Allahabad. In a way, she
has chalked out the programme before theCongress on the eve of elections in UP.
Much will depend on how the various parties fare in the state polls.
That may influence the parliamentary election in 2019 and give direction to the
country, including the Congress. The Party's problem is that it has not won any
election so far since the advent of Modi. Even in the Maharashtra civic polls, the
BJP is ahead of the Congress. Gujarat has gone completely to the BJP. This should
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worry the secular, liberal forces. The BJP is entrenching itself and the Congress is
going down.

The writer is an eminent Indian columnist.

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