congress-under-tremendous-pressure-from-india-bloc-over-aap

The Congress appears to be under tremendous pressure from some of the partners within the Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) over its relationship with the Aam Aadmi Party. The principal party in the INDIA bloc appears to be getting isolated after it decided to take a strong position against the AAP in the Delhi assembly elections.

 

For the Congress it is a ‘catch-22’ situation. Its rank and file in the national capital is keen to contest the Delhi assembly elections and re-establish its foothold there. Prominent leaders like Ajay Maken and Sandeep Dikshit are aggressively campaigning against the AAP. The AAP leader, Arvind Kejriwal has accused the Congress leaders of doing the BJP’s bidding.

 

Congress has nothing to lose in Delhi and gain everything. The AAP has everything to lose if the Congress decides to jump in the fray with full force.

 

There is a possibility that improved performance by the Congress can badly hit the AAP to the advantage of the BJP which none of the INDIA bloc partners would like. For the Congress it is not choosing the lesser evil as it has started realising that both the BJP as well as the AAP are a threat to its existence.

 

The AAP may be numerically very inconsequential in terms of the number of MPs in the Lok Sabha or the Rajya Sabha, but the stature of its leader Arvind Kejriwal is quite high as he is deemed to be a potential challenger to the Prime Minister Narendra Modi, after Rahul Gandhi.

 

INDIA allies like the Trinamool Congress, the Samajwadi Party and the Shiv Sena-UB have already positioned themselves in favour of the AAP. They believe that for the survival and strength of the INDIA bloc, a strong AAP is very important. In case, the AAP loses Delhi, it will have consequential impact on the INDIA bloc also.

 

Besides, it will conversely provide an additional advantage to the BJP. The BJP after its less than expected performance in the General Elections, has reorganised and regained its strength with emphatic victories in Maharashtra and Haryana.

 

However, it could not win Jharkhand, where the Jarkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM) led INDIA bloc got reelected. In Jharkhand, the JMM, the Congress and the Rashtriya Janata Dal fought the elections together and trounced the BJP.

 

In Delhi, however, the alliance between the Congress and the AAP looked quite untenable. There were two reasons for that. First, the AAP and the Congress and their cadres are ferociously opposed to each other. 13 years ago, the AAP was primarily formed on the anti-Congress plank. That rival hostility still prevails among the cadres and the local leaders.

 

The Congress, at the top level, might have wanted to go for an alliance with the AAP for the assembly elections, the way they fought the Lok Sabha elections together. But even then the alliance lost all the seven parliamentary seats of Delhi.

 

No alliance succeeds when the cadres at the grassroots level are not able to bring out the synergy needed for running it irrespective of the understanding between the leaders at the top. In the AAP and Congress case, particularly in Delhi they were hostile to each other. The alliance could not deliver anything in Delhi as it lost all the seven seats to the BJP.

 

Faced with a tough challenge, the AAP has been trying to pull all the stops. An aggressive and assertive Congress in the fray will be the last thing the AAP would like. Moreover, the AAP is faced with eleven years of anti-incumbency also. The party is at a weak wicket as compared to the previous three elections, but not necessarily as weak as to lose imminently. It remains an open game in Delhi.

 

The choice is really very difficult for the Congress. It is not the issue of Delhi alone. It will set a precedent for the party to leave the space for the regional parties wherever they are in a better position to fight the BJP. This way the party will continuously lose its space and cadres to the rivals, mainly the BJP.

 

Arvinder Singh Lovely, the sitting Delhi Congress president, resigned and joined the BJP just ahead of the General Elections in disapproval of the party’s alliance with the AAP.

 

Senior party leader and the AICC Treasurer Ajay Maken a couple of weeks ago accused Kejriwal of being an anti-national and also described him as ‘Farziwal’ (fraud). While the AAP strongly protested such comments and sought his apology, lest it seeks Congress expulsion from INDIA, Maken went ahead with the same charges again some days later.

 

However, there appears to be a rethink within the Congress as to how to deal with the AAP issue without endangering the INDIA unity.

 

Maken had announced a press conference a day in advance saying he will prove how Kejriwal was an “anti-national”. However, that press conference was cancelled at the eleventh hour raising speculations about Congress’ stance towards the AAP.

 

However, the Congress from its official ‘X’ handle (earlier Twitter) posted a 53 second video alleging corruption by Kejriwal and also showed his renovated and refurbished official residence, which has come under scanner for allegedly lavish spending.

 

Congress general secretary in-charge organization KC Venugopal however was subtle in his criticism of the AAP on the social media bracketing both the BJP and the AAP together.

 

Welcoming the announcement of elections he said in a tweet, “on 5th February, Delhi will get to make a decision on whether it wishes to see 5 more years of chaos and confrontation between the State and Centre, or a stable government that works solely for the people.

 

The present regime, be it the Centre or the State, has failed to address the basic concerns of the people - with pollution, crime, poor infrastructure and urban decay becoming the norm”.

 

The Congress will have to take a tough call amidst strong pressure from other INDIA allies as to how to go about in Delhi. Its current decision will have far reaching consequences for the party in the long run. How far it can go on conceding its own space to different regional parties just to keep BJP out of power, it will have to decide. IN the process it is only politically killing itself.

 

Today, if it succumbs to the allies’ pressure in Delhi, two years from now, it may have to go for a similar compromise in Punjab as well, where the Congress is on ascendancy. Given the master strategist that Kejriwal is, who knows how to derive the best political bargain, he has managed to rally quite a few allies with himself for Delhi elections.

 

For the Congress it is a tough call in Delhi as to how to confront the BJP and the AAP, an INDIA member. It is getting isolated, as other allies want it to support the AAP, which is facing a “do or die” battle against the BJP. Congress is faced with a Hobson’s choice. If it chooses to support AAP, or at least goes low, it runs the risk of completely getting wiped out from Delhi.

 

Besides, it will set a precedent for other regional parties forcing Congress to concede its space against the BJP in other states. This way, the Congress runs the risk of gradually exiting itself from most of the states across the country. Ironically, the INDIA allies’ stance fits best into the BJP’s scheme of things of ‘Congress-mukt-Bharat’ (an India without Congress).

 

The Congress will need to assert itself and must not concede its political space to other parties just to keep the BJP in check. For the time being it appears to be taking a very guarded position, having already silenced the AAP critics like Ajay Maken and Sandeep Dikshit within the party. But that may not be a good idea in the long term interest of the party.