CWC meeting, manifesto committee, rejig—what’s behind last week’s activities in Congress

If the Congress' allies sought to undermine the Gandhis by proposing Kharge as the PM candidate, the Gandhis have reacted loudly and clearly—not in words but in action.

Representative photo: CWC meet | PTI

On Friday evening, the Congress set up a 16-member manifesto committee, chaired by P Chidambaram, for the 2024 Lok Sabha election. Former Chhattisgarh deputy chief minister TS Singh Deo was appointed convenor. It was a big leg-up for someone on whose home turf, Sarguja, the party was wiped out in the recent assembly election. That almost half of the committee—seven, to be precise—have never contested a direct election is beside the point, too. Those drafting the manifesto are expected to know the pulse of the people, but most committee members are known experts at taking the first family’s pulse.

Imran Pratapgarhi, who would describe gangsters-turned-politicians like Atiq Ahmed and Mukhtar Ansari as “lion”, joined the Congress in 2019, lost his maiden Lok Sabha election badly, made it to the Rajya Sabha in 2022, and has now made it to the manifesto committee—thanks to Priyanka Vadra who also happens to be on this committee.

On Saturday, Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge carried out a major organisational reshuffle. It wasn’t even old wine in a new bottle. In this case, even the bottle is old; only labels have been changed. Priyanka Vadra had a rather forgettable run as AICC general secretary in charge of eastern Uttar Pradesh in the 2019 Lok Sabha election and then as general secretary in charge of entire UP in the 2022 assembly election. The Congress was decimated in both. On Saturday, she was retained—or chose to stay—as general secretary “without any assigned portfolio”. She is obviously not going to be confined to one or two states and would rather play a larger role as a national star campaigner and also in running party affairs.

“There were several inputs on the issue of one person occupying a position for several years. It is in the interest of the organisation to limit the term of a position for five years so that new people got an opportunity,” said the party in the much-hyped Udaipur Nav Sankalp Declaration in May 2022. Well, the person under whose signature the new list of office-bearers was released on Saturday was KC Venugopal, AICC general secretary (organisation). Venugopal has been AICC general secretary since April 2017. The five-year term limit in the Udaipur Declaration was obviously a jumla.

Why single out Venugopal, though? If you look at the list of 12 general secretaries following Saturday’s reshuffle, you may just yawn. Except for a couple of faces like Sachin Pilot, whose shift to the Centre as general secretary was also expected, the list gives the same old, tired, dispirited look with family loyalists retaining their places—Mukul Wasnik, Randeep Surjewala, Jitendra Singh, Jairam Ramesh, Kumari Selja, you name it.

The appointment of Deepa Dasmunsi, wife of former Union minister Priya Ranjan Dasmunsi, as a general secretary came as a surprise, though. She has been given charge of Kerala and Telangana. Dasmunsi has been a bitter critic of West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee and had contested against her in the Bhowanipore constituency in 2016.

What’s common between the events

That takes us back to 19 December, when the Opposition alliance INDIA met in New Delhi and to 21 December, when the Congress Working Committee (CWC) met.

Mamata Banerjee and AAP chief convenor Arvind Kejriwal teamed up to embarrass the Gandhis by proposing Kharge’s name as INDIA’s PM candidate or its convenor. Come to think of it, Banerjee and Kejriwal, two prime ministerial aspirants, were offering the leadership role to the Congress on a platter. They had to be mighty convinced that the Gandhis wouldn’t accept it. One can give a hundred reasons how a Dalit PM candidate could go a long way in helping the Congress—to name just one, by re-building its trust quotient with around 17 per cent Scheduled Caste population. But that’s the second priority for Congress leaders. No guessing the top priority.

At the CWC meeting, nobody said a word about the two alliance partners proposing the Congress president’s name as INDIA’s PM candidate. Kharge is a past master at this. He quickly proposed an east-to-west Bharat Jodo Yatra of Rahul Gandhi to put the CWC at ease. Whatever Banerjee-Kejriwal’s intent, he wasn’t going to be caught in the crosshairs within his party.

And Banerjee had her own way of getting back at the Congress the next day. At the INDIA bloc’s protest at Delhi’s Jantar Mantar against the suspension of 146 MPs in Parliament, she sent Mausam Noor, niece of Congress stalwart ABA Ghani Khan Choudhury. Noor had quit the Congress in January 2019 to join the TMC after the former decided against a tie-up with the latter. Incidentally, a day before the CWC meeting, Banerjee had taken a veiled dig at Rahul Gandhi, saying that people wouldn’t have known about her party MP Kalyan Banerjee mimicking Vice-President Jagdeep Dhankhar had the Congress leader not recorded it on his mobile.

So, are the INDIA meeting, Congress’ manifesto committee, organisational reshuffle, and other events spread over a week connected? They are. And how? If the Congress party’s allies sought to undermine the Gandhis by proposing Kharge as the PM candidate, the Gandhis have reacted loudly and clearly—not in words but in action. Nothing has changed in the Congress. The family is in full control and won’t allow any other party or leader to suggest anything otherwise. If the INDIA bloc looks conflicted in the process, so be it. The Gandhis’ stake goes much beyond the 2024 or 2029 elections.

After Kharge took over as the Congress president last year, Rahul Gandhi remained the final voice in party matters but started giving enough space to him to do his own experiments in organisational matters. The Congress president let regional satraps run the show in the recent assembly elections while the AICC played a supporting role. With Kharge at the helm, the high command’s image was changing—from an intrusive, rampaging control freak into a facilitator and guide. Defeat in MP, Rajasthan, and Chhattisgarh gave the Gandhis and their loyalists an opportunity to reassert the high command’s authority. That should explain the inclusion of TS Singh Deo, not Bhupesh Baghel, considered a brilliant political mind until 3 December in the manifesto committee. That also explains how so many Congress leaders suddenly found a voice to criticise Kamal Nath at the CWC meeting—probably the first time since the latter, considered Indira Gandhi’s ‘third son’, joined the Indian Youth Congress 55 years ago.

DK Singh is ThePrint’s Political Editor. Views are personal.

(Edited by Humra Laeeq)