Status Quo Within Ties Congress Hands Outside

Parliament’s monsoon session got off to a stormy start with a slew of contentious moves, especially the three ‘farm bills’, drawing relentless criticism by a seemingly united Opposition. But, even as the Congress tried to corner the Narendra Modi government, it also ensured that senior leaders who had recently petitioned interim party chief Sonia Gandhi, asking for organisational reforms, did not emerge as the face of the onslaught against the Centre.

Among the 23 leaders who had signed the letter, there were seven MPs—Ghulam Nabi Azad (leader of Opposition in the Rajya Sabha), Anand Sharma, Kapil Sibal, Vivek Tankha, Akhilesh Prasad Singh, Shashi Tharoor and Manish Tewari. While Azad and Sharma made strong interventions in the Rajya Sabha against the government on the border conflict with China, the farm bills and the suspension of eight Opposition MPs, Tharoor and Tewari have been blistering in their criticism in the Lok Sabha. None of them, however, was sought out by the Congress to address the media at briefings following the day’s business in either House. The task has largely been left to the party’s leader in the Lok Sabha, Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury, and his deputy, Gaurav Gogoi, newly sworn-in Rajya Sabha MP and party general secretary K.C. Venugopal, Congress media cell chief Randeep Surjewala, who isn’t an MP, and a few others.

Days before the monsoon session commenced, Sonia had revamped the AICC and recast several committees, including the parliament strategy group. These changes were ostensibly meant to send a conciliatory signal to the letter writers and give heft to Sonia’s claim of holding “no ill-will” against them. Azad and Sharma were retained in the reconstituted parliament strategy group, though Tewari was dropped. However, if goings-on of the past week are any indication, the party is in no mood yet to extend any niceties to reform-seekers.

Sonia is in the US with Rahul Gandhi for her medical check-up. Rahul’s absence during a crucial Parliament session has irked his pro-reform colleagues, who see it as vindication of their demand for a “visible and full-time leadership”. “We recognise that it is his responsibility to be by the side of his ailing mother, but we have to be alive to how this absence will play out in public,” says one of the 23 signatories who didn’t wish to be identified. “Farmers are protesting, democracy is being murdered in Parliament and our leader is away.”

Public anger over farm bills, Covid pandemic, China and economic crisis has given the Congress enough ammunition to build a sustained broadside against the government and, in the process, revive itself politically. It is, however, busy perpetuating sycophancy around the Nehru-Gandhi family. The letter writers, meanwhile, plan to discuss their future course after October 1. Talk of getting political priorities right?