Aiyar’s ‘neech aadmi’ remark about PM Modi and Sibal’s plea to defer the Ayodhya SC hearing until 2019 damaged the Congress’s hopes.
New Delhi: The Congress party made two notable mistakes while the campaign for the Gujarat polls was on – the comment made by Mani Shankar Aiyar against Prime Minister Narendra Modi, and the argument presented by Kapil Sibal in the Ayodhya case in the Supreme Court. And both came back to haunt it in the final analysis.
On 6 December, senior Congress leader and Rajya Sabha MP Sibal argued in the apex court that the hearing of the Ayodhya title suit should be deferred to July 2019, by when the next general elections would be held. Sibal was representing Iqbal Ansari, heir to Hashim Ansari, the original petitioner in the case.
The next day, on 7 December, another senior Congress leader and Rajya Sabha MP, Aiyar called Modi a ‘neech aadmi’.
The BJP grabbed both and changed the narrative of the Gujarat campaign. While it was too late for these to have much of an impact on the first phase of the polls – campaigning ended on 7 December ahead of polling on 9 December – the BJP used it extensively during the second phase of the campaign. Even Modi mentioned them in every rally he addressed.
If one compares the results of the two phases, the difference is striking – in the 89 seats that went to the polls in the first phase, the Congress’s tally improved from 22 in 2012 to 40 in 2017. However, in the second phase of 93 seats, the Congress’s tally improved by just one – from 39 to 40.
“This was a close election, and even a small mistake matters. The kind of campaigner Modi is, comments against him were bound to hit the Congress,” says A.K. Verma, a political analyst based in Kanpur.
Congress spokesperson and media in-charge Randeep Singh Surjewala, however, denied any such effect.
“We were honest and truthful in our campaigns, offering hope for the people of Gujarat. The party took no time in taking action against Aiyar, as we don’t support that kind of politics, which is mostly pursued by the BJP,” he said.
It’s true that the Congress tried to limit the damage caused by Aiyar and Sibal, but the BJP’s pitch seemed to have scored over the Congress’s explanations and actions.
I do not think votes in Gujarat understood Sibal’s pleas, but they did understood well Mani Shankar’s ill timed dealings with Pakistanis and his remarks..
There are many in Congress because of whom the party cannot claim moral high ground. Congress may have gone down fighting in Gujarat, but it was a knockout in the end.