Even if Rahul Gandhi is called merely the chief charioteer into the grand battle of 2014, his defeat is certain. Sonia Gandhi's last-minute decision not to name him prime ministerial candidate is really inconsequential for May 2014. Nobody believes there will be a Congress prime minister at all.
And yet, Rahul seems strangely eager to take on the mantle of a losing battle. What was the need for the party to make Manmohan Singh call a press conference and make the unusual announcement that he isn't in the prime ministerial race anymore? You would think the party would like to make someone else the fall guy for 2014 – and who better than Manmohan Singh?
Congress party insiders say Rahul Gandhi has made up his mind to lose the 2014 election and sit in the opposition. Election 2014 is not a matter of life and death, he's been heard telling cadres. When he saw the poor crowd response to rallies for the Delhi state election recently, he just cancelled the rest of the rallies. The party's central leadership did nothing to even try to win Delhi. When given some wise counsel about why the party lost Rajasthan, Rahul Gandhi said he wasn't interested. He's looking ahead.
A Congress out of power and in the opposition benches is what Rahul is looking forward to. It's the opportunity to “cleanse” the party, in the words of one insider. Put plainly, it's Rahul vs the Old Guard and Rahul feels the need to establish who the boss is. That can't happen unless the burden of power is taken off the party's shoulders.
The old guard – these days vocally championed by Janardhan Dwivedi – doesn’t think this way. They believe Rahul's leadership is letting them down. While Rahul feels the party should have used its ten years in power to grow organisationally, the old guard feels it was Rahul who was taking care of the party's growth and hasn't got anywhere with it. Rahul wants to create a new, transparent party that is more welcoming to outsiders and upstarts. The old guard would rather that it remains a privileged, closed-door club.
Beyond that big disagreement are various differences on concrete issues. These include the support to the Aam Aadmi Party's government in Delhi, whether the party should stitch up a pre-poll alliance in Bihar with Nitish Kumar or Lalu Prasad Yadav, and whether an effort should have been made to bring Andhra's Jagan Reddy back into the party.
The old guard can see it is losing control to a new set of boys who work with corporate strategies and take NGO types seriously. It doesn't help that Jairam Ramesh has become Rahul's top advisor. In critical matters such as ticket distribution, Team RG has taken away a lot of the job of Sonia Gandhi's political secretary, Ahmed Patel. The senior hands brought in by Rahul Gandhi – such as Madhusudan Mistry, Sam Pitroda and Jairam Ramesh – are considered politically naive by Patel.
But it isn't just Ahmed Patel, it's also Patel's boss, Sonia Gandhi. The once-enigmatic relationship between mother and son seems to be giving way to an unspoken tension that is becoming more obvious by the day. “No two people are the same,” says Rasheed Kidwai, author of a biography of Sonia Gandhi and another on the working of the Congress headquarters. “Indira and Rajiv were not the same. Indira and Sanjay were not the same. As a result there are separate coteries around Rahul and Sonia, and the coteries tend to work at cross-purposes. Rahul Gandhi is a prisoner of his own image. He tries to bring change to a party that is allergic to change. The result is a leadership crisis.”
To settle the dispute, it is not enough to make apparent the heir apparent. When does he really get to run the show? Sonia Gandhi is said to be unwell enough that she won't be able to campaign with the same vigour as she used to. That makes it all the more urgent for her and the party to put its weight behind Rahul just before what could be the party's worst election result. The demonstration of unity behind the Gandhi family that the Congress puts up may give way if the party gets less than 100 seats. Its internal estimates say the drubbing could get as bad as 70. To be reduced to double digits would be a first. Rahul's position needs to be fortified in anticipation of a mini revolt, or at least a re-formation of coteries.
Sonia has been a consensus builder who balances the various factions and interests of the party. But Rahul is the impatient prince with a vision he can't wait to see in action. For the moment, his sister Priyanka has stepped in as the person who irons out the differences between various sides. That is still an ad hoc arrangement. The old order passeth, the new one isn't in place yet.
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And yet, Rahul seems strangely eager to take on the mantle of a losing battle. What was the need for the party to make Manmohan Singh call a press conference and make the unusual announcement that he isn't in the prime ministerial race anymore? You would think the party would like to make someone else the fall guy for 2014 – and who better than Manmohan Singh?
Congress party insiders say Rahul Gandhi has made up his mind to lose the 2014 election and sit in the opposition. Election 2014 is not a matter of life and death, he's been heard telling cadres. When he saw the poor crowd response to rallies for the Delhi state election recently, he just cancelled the rest of the rallies. The party's central leadership did nothing to even try to win Delhi. When given some wise counsel about why the party lost Rajasthan, Rahul Gandhi said he wasn't interested. He's looking ahead.
A Congress out of power and in the opposition benches is what Rahul is looking forward to. It's the opportunity to “cleanse” the party, in the words of one insider. Put plainly, it's Rahul vs the Old Guard and Rahul feels the need to establish who the boss is. That can't happen unless the burden of power is taken off the party's shoulders.
The old guard – these days vocally championed by Janardhan Dwivedi – doesn’t think this way. They believe Rahul's leadership is letting them down. While Rahul feels the party should have used its ten years in power to grow organisationally, the old guard feels it was Rahul who was taking care of the party's growth and hasn't got anywhere with it. Rahul wants to create a new, transparent party that is more welcoming to outsiders and upstarts. The old guard would rather that it remains a privileged, closed-door club.
Beyond that big disagreement are various differences on concrete issues. These include the support to the Aam Aadmi Party's government in Delhi, whether the party should stitch up a pre-poll alliance in Bihar with Nitish Kumar or Lalu Prasad Yadav, and whether an effort should have been made to bring Andhra's Jagan Reddy back into the party.
The old guard can see it is losing control to a new set of boys who work with corporate strategies and take NGO types seriously. It doesn't help that Jairam Ramesh has become Rahul's top advisor. In critical matters such as ticket distribution, Team RG has taken away a lot of the job of Sonia Gandhi's political secretary, Ahmed Patel. The senior hands brought in by Rahul Gandhi – such as Madhusudan Mistry, Sam Pitroda and Jairam Ramesh – are considered politically naive by Patel.
But it isn't just Ahmed Patel, it's also Patel's boss, Sonia Gandhi. The once-enigmatic relationship between mother and son seems to be giving way to an unspoken tension that is becoming more obvious by the day. “No two people are the same,” says Rasheed Kidwai, author of a biography of Sonia Gandhi and another on the working of the Congress headquarters. “Indira and Rajiv were not the same. Indira and Sanjay were not the same. As a result there are separate coteries around Rahul and Sonia, and the coteries tend to work at cross-purposes. Rahul Gandhi is a prisoner of his own image. He tries to bring change to a party that is allergic to change. The result is a leadership crisis.”
To settle the dispute, it is not enough to make apparent the heir apparent. When does he really get to run the show? Sonia Gandhi is said to be unwell enough that she won't be able to campaign with the same vigour as she used to. That makes it all the more urgent for her and the party to put its weight behind Rahul just before what could be the party's worst election result. The demonstration of unity behind the Gandhi family that the Congress puts up may give way if the party gets less than 100 seats. Its internal estimates say the drubbing could get as bad as 70. To be reduced to double digits would be a first. Rahul's position needs to be fortified in anticipation of a mini revolt, or at least a re-formation of coteries.
Sonia has been a consensus builder who balances the various factions and interests of the party. But Rahul is the impatient prince with a vision he can't wait to see in action. For the moment, his sister Priyanka has stepped in as the person who irons out the differences between various sides. That is still an ad hoc arrangement. The old order passeth, the new one isn't in place yet.