INDIA has a Congress-sized hole. And the fix begins with a little humility

Without a Congress revival, there can be no challenge to the BJP pan-nationally. Modi’s party is growing, and almost entirely at the cost of the Congress.

Illustration by Shruti Naithani | ThePrint

After the Lok Sabha stumble 18 months ago, the spectacular wins in Haryana, Maharashtra, Delhi and now Bihar, Narendra Modi’s followers can believe his invincibility is back. And India’s politics is back to being a one-horse race.

His opponents, at the same time, will think about what they are doing wrong, why doesn’t anti-incumbency hurt him or his partners, and how did INDIA bloc lose the momentum of the summer of 2024. They could begin by asking themselves some hard questions. More specifically, they have to ask Congress party. The devastating post-Lok Sabha slide of the Opposition is mostly owed to the Congress.

Without a Congress revival there can be no challenge to the BJP. In West Bengal and Tamil Nadu Mamata Banerjee and M.K. Stalin can still keep him at bay. Kerala has its own peculiar politics, but the BJP is growing and almost entirely at the cost of the Congress. In states where Congress piggybacks on a vote-bank rich regional party, it’s a liability. Check out Uttar Pradesh with Akhilesh Yadav’s SP in 2017, Bihar with RJD in 2020 and now.

Everywhere else, a direct BJP-Congress fight is a non-contest after its heady flicker of 2024. And yet, the Congress retains just over 20 percent votes nationally. Whether 44 seats in 2014 or 99 (with alliances) in 2024, it has remained intact. One in five Indians simply vote for the Congress symbol. Let’s see it this way. In 2024 the Congress polled 21.4 percent of the vote. That is more than the aggregate vote share of the next eight parties, from NDA and INDIA alliances.

It’s a lot of votes to begin with. How does the party see this? There are two upshots, one leading to the other.

The first, that the Congress does not need 37 percent (BJP’s approximate Lok Sabha vote) to beat Modi. Even a 5 percent shift can change India’s politics. The BJP with 31-2 percent vote may still stay in power, but it will be in a genuine coalition. It can also open up the leadership race within the BJP. Does the Congress have the skills, guts and most importantly the humility to think about finding just that additional 5 percent? From 22 to 27 percent?

Humility brings us to the next question. How does the Congress see its one-in-five vote share? A perpetual inheritance and therefore, continue seeing itself as India’s Grand Old Party or more specifically, India’s party of power by default.

That means it believes that inevitably and soon enough, voters will realise how stupid they were to vote for Modi. And then where else will they go, but to return ‘home’ to them? This is disrespectful of competitive politics. If 11 Modi years have not ‘awakened’ people from this ‘nightmare,’ when will that ‘soon enough’ be?

Instead of seeing itself as India’s GOP, can the Congress reboot as a Modi-era startup with a committed 20 percent vote as its initial capital? Since any startup must have a Unique Selling Proposition (USP), this is the Congress party’s. But after generations of being the default party of power, beginning afresh as a startup needs humility. That Rahul Gandhi and his increasingly apolitical praetorian guard haven’t displayed lately. If anything, even mild criticism draws the vilest social media abuse. That’s the only area where the Congress beats the BJP now.

Congress’s repeated failures to build on its inherited capital bring us to its unquestioned leader, Rahul Gandhi.

Since 2013, Rahul Gandhi has built his pitch over what’s wrong with Modi, RSS and the BJP. It was communalism first, the death of Judge Brijgopal Harkishan Loya next, Rafale purchase, Adani and Hindenburg, Ambani-Adani and “Modi ji ke mitra” (the Modi cronies), vote-chori through the Election Commission and social inequalities, which he was going to address through a caste census. If all bombed so devastatingly, it’s telling him something.

If Congress had that humility, it would read its history. In 1971 Indira Gandhi promised India a better future and the combined Opposition gave a call to remove her. She swept that election with the counter: they say Indira hatao (remove Indira), and Indiraji says garibi hatao (eradicate poverty). You decide. Given India’s demographics, voters will always be predominantly young, looking at the future more than lean into the past.

And positive agenda is way more likely to work with them than bitterness, contempt or fear of the incumbent for voters to reach that ‘anybody but my current leadership’ fury, disappointments have to be much deeper. We’ve seen both of these play out in 1977 (Mrs Gandhi, post-Emergency) and Rajiv Gandhi, 1989. The rout of the UPA in 2014 was only marginally because of negativity. It was the success of Modi’s positive promise of “achche din” (better days).

What is Rahul Gandhi’s equivalent of ‘achche din’? What’s he promised since the loss in 2014? Some giveaways like NYAY, free bus rides and power, cash doles. On each Modi ups the offer. He owns the treasury.

Rahul’s permanent angry young man act isn’t working. It worked for Amitabh Bachchan in the mid-seventies when India battled about 30 percent inflation, deep poverty and hopelessness. In any case, real politics isn’t a Manmohan Desai movie. In today’s equation, Modi is promising Viksit Bharat. Rahul hasn’t moved on from vote chori and caste census. As Bihar shows, people have rejected the first. And Modi has made the second his own.

Anger in any aspect of life can be a useful ploy if used wisely, deliberately and with the greatest discretion. You also must know where to stop and return to that wagon of positivity. Let’s borrow from Rahul’s father and call it the Mera Bharat Mahan (Make India Great Again) train.

Modi will play you and that’s fair in politics. Deep, chronic anger, however, will walk you into unforced errors. In just the week leading up to the first round of Bihar voting Rahul made two pitches he had better reflect on. One, that the same 10 percent (caste) elites control the Army, as with the other institutions and power centres. Second, that Jay Shah controlled all of Indian cricket. This is when the armed forces have peak adulation post-Op Sindoor and Indian men and women have won three ICC trophies and an Asia Cup (where they beat Pakistan three times) in succession. In any case, the Army and cricket are the holiest of India’s holy cows. You either have to be nuts to take them on. Or very, very angry. It won’t get you any votes.

It’s evident there can be no challenge to Modi without a rejuvenated Congress party. To be worthy of leading this challenge the Congress has to shed anger, disdain, even contempt for Modi and try some humility. Why does Modi keep winning and us losing is a good question to begin with. The best beginning to fighting an all-conquering rival is to show him some respect, not arrogance. Without that reboot, their party will melt away like so many arrogant “main bhi soon-to-be unicorn” startups. Or, the way it’s going, even the regional partners will begin to see Congress as an unaffordable liability and move away, finding modus vivendi with Modi rather than fight him. Just like Chandrababu Naidu.

And who knows, it may be ripe for the political equivalent of a shareholder revolt and management change.