Mumbai: The Congress should allow local leadership to develop as too much control from the state or the Centre can result in a lack of initiative on the part of local leaders, Rajasthan Deputy Chief Minister Sachin Pilot said Tuesday.
Pilot was speaking to ThePrint’s Chairman and Editor-in-Chief Shekhar Gupta at Off The Cuff in Mumbai Tuesday.
“What I did in Rajasthan was I made sure that my district leaders were fully in power. They had the powers to do anything. If they wanted to oppose the government’s policy in one district, they took that call. If you give that autonomy to your local leaders, they perform,” said Pilot, who is also Rajasthan Congress president.
He added, “If you straight jacket them too much, have too much command and control from Jaipur or Delhi then I think there is a lack of initiative. In different states, we’ve got to allow leadership to develop and let people feel that they have been given the space and platform to perform.”
With three states going to elections this year — Maharashtra and Haryana on 21 October, and then Jharkhand — Pilot said it is crucial for his party to win key states in order to get good Lok Sabha numbers.
“In Punjab, we have Capt. Amarinder Singh who delivered the state. Strong state leaderships are going to deliver Lok Sabha seats in Delhi,” said the Congress leader.
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Modi a hardworking PM, but needs to be more inclusive
Pilot praised Prime Minister Narendra Modi for being a “hardworking man”, but added that he needs to be more inclusive as a prime minister.
“You may not like all that he does. There has been opposition to his policies such as demonetisation, how Article 370 was abrogated from Jammu and Kashmir. But, you have to accept that he is a hardworking man. We have to accept that and then of alternatives,” Pilot said.
“As India’s PM, one thing that he could do is be more inclusive. For example, I don’t know how many all-party meetings he has had on important issues. I have a lot of respect for my opponents but that doesn’t mean I accept what they stand for,” he said.
For instance, on the scrapping of Article 370 from Jammu & Kashmir, Pilot said, the Modi government was well within its moral rights to take such a move as it had promised it in its election manifesto, and people voted for the government based on it. But its implementation could have been better, Pilot said.
“Had the government come up with a resolution that was acceptable to most parties in the Parliament, if not all, then for India as a country, we would not have faced the flak we are facing internationally on the issue. That would have given a lot of moral authority to the government of today,” Pilot said.
The Congress leader also said the Modi government has a perception issue with regards to not allowing businesses to run freely, which the PM needs to set right.
“Right now there is command and control. There is a sense that there is someone looking over you all the time. It has to be done by the top head of the government. If the PM says things are going to improve and people can do business in the most free way possible, a lot can change,” he asserted.
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Differences with CM Ashok Gehlot
Pilot, who is known to be at odds with Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot, accepted that there are differences between them, but said they don’t hinder their work.
“If every political party, every leader thought and acted the same way, there would be no plurality. We have different ways of functioning, which is fine. He is the CM and I am the party president of the Congress party and we work together. We have kept the common objective in mind that we have to deliver to the people of Rajasthan and those 7 crore people do not care whether I get along, you get along,” Pilot said.
Amid a popular perception that there isn’t enough democracy in the Congress party, controlled top-down by the Gandhi family, Pilot said he has always had the freedom to speak out candidly to Congress president Sonia Gandhi or Rahul Gandhi, even if they don’t agree with his opinion.
Pilot also added that India’s politics is getting much more aggressive than it should be.
“There are differences, but politics of confrontation is not good for anyone…There should be far more outreach across parties. We should talk to each other rather than talking at each other,” Pilot added.
