Newly elected Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge has the toughest job of any of his predecessors — reviving a moribund, dissidence-ridden and much-diminished party well before the 2024 general elections. Is he up to the job?
The housekeeping challenges alone are formidable; from resolving the Rajasthan imbroglio to dealing with detractors to bridging the generational divide — all the while looking over his shoulder and treading on eggshells around the Gandhis.
The fact that Kharge’s rival, Shashi Tharoor, managed to garner 12% of the vote is significant. Tharoor’s merits — he is articulate, an intellectual, a former international civil servant, a best-selling author and a (surprisingly) successful politician — may have contributed to his 1,074 votes.
But more to the point, his credible performance indicates that the ‘G-23’ (a reference to Congress leaders who called for an overhaul of the party organisation in 2020) has its sympathisers among party members who want change. Many Congress members are deeply unhappy with the first family’s business-as-usual approach.
Kharge will have to take this into account, going forward. He may well choose to make an ally of Tharoor, by giving him a significant post, provided the Gandhis agree. The Grand Old Party needs fresh ideas that differentiate the Congress from the BJP. It needs to shed outdated ideological baggage and appeal to the increasingly aspirational youth demographic. That’s where Tharoor could prove most valuable, by charting a new course for the party.
Kharge enjoys considerable stature, with 11 successive electoral victories and a long stint as leader of the Opposition behind him, but how much autonomy can he exercise? The only two non-Gandhi Congress presidents since 1980 — PV Narasimha Rao and Sitaram Kesri — asserted their independence and fell out with the first family. Both were subsequently ousted.
Rao was loyal to the family and preferred over stalwarts like Sharad Pawar and Arjun Singh, but came to be regarded as a quisling. The family lost trust in him, encouraged his detractors and publicly criticised his decisions. Kesri, likewise, despite following family diktats with which he did not agree (such as keeping Ramakrishna Hegde out of the party, while admitting Arjun Singh & Co), was summarily ejected from the post of Congress president.
Nothing in Kharge’s long career, or his recent obsequious pronouncements, suggests that he might exhibit an independence of spirit. Will he, like Manmohan Singh, shoulder responsibility while power vests with the family?
Rahul Gandhi has already declared that it is Kharge who will decide how he is to be deployed, but the general sentiment within the party is that the former will remain its political face, while the latter handles day-to-day operational aspects. He will be COO while Gandhi remains de facto CEO.
His immediate challenge is Rajasthan, where Ashok Gehlot is so firmly glued to the chief ministerial chair that he gave up the chance to lead the Congress. Kharge will certainly need the family’s aid in managing the ambitious Sachin Pilot, whose rebellion in 2020 was staved off only through the intervention of the Gandhi siblings.
The impression that Kharge’s elevation empowers the Old Guard may be misplaced, as the coteries around the Gandhi siblings will have to be accommodated. That brings us to the question of how the Congress Working Committee (CWC), the highest decision making body of the party, will be constituted.
Tharoor had promised to hold elections to the CWC if he won the poll. Back in 1997, under Kesri’s stewardship, Sharad Pawar, Ahmed Patel and AK Antony were among those who were elected with big margins. But as of 2000, the Congress president is at liberty to choose CWC members, after Sonia Gandhi ensured a resolution to this effect. She was able to award or withhold CWC membership at will, thereby reducing party leaders to supplicants.
If Kharge wants to placate dissidents and signal change, he should avoid taking the nomination route and opt for holding elections. The official candidates will win for the most part, but a handful of nonconformists may also slip in, which would not be a bad thing for the party. Otherwise, he will not be able to stem the continuing exodus from the party, or curb the creeping influence of AAP. He would also do well to revive the Parliamentary Board.
The upcoming elections in Himachal Pradesh and Gujarat will be the first test of Kharge’s mettle. If he can pull it off, his job would be well begun, and half-done.
Bhavdeep Kang is a freelance writer and author of ‘Gurus: Stories of India’s Leading Babas’ and ‘Just Transferred: The Untold Story of Ashok Khemka’. A journalist since 1986, she has written extensively on national politics. The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not represent the stand of this publication.
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