The recent ruckus in the Parliament, resulting in severe injuries to a frail BJP MP Pratap Sarangi, one of the poorest, humblest members of the house and to another MP has made clear to the Indian public Rahul Gandhi’s intentions. To do even better than his granny in terms of destroying institutions of democracy and engaging in political violence. I do hope the government and the judiciary will take evidence into account and make sure the guilty are not spared, however elite or connected their families are.
Let us ignore that incident for now but focus on the real question – what exactly is going on? When I saw the post by Ankit Jain, he seemed to ask the right question and it made me think.
“Something is going on in the background that Congress has become so aggressive. There is no reason as elections are not anytime soon”
The answer, friends, is not what we think it is. Here is my take.
As usual, let us start with a movie anecdote. In Moonraker, the villain challenges Bond to shoot birds with a rifle, having positioned a sniper on a tree to kill him. Bond aims for the bird he is supposed to shoot but actually shoots the sniper accurately. “You miss, Mr. Bond” says the villain. “Did I?” retorts Roger Moore, as the sniper’s body falls from the tree.
The point here is, Bond’s aim has always been clear – he is aiming at the sniper. But both the villain (who did a superb job in the movie Day of the Jackal as the police officer, by the way) and many of us in the audience are fooled.
Rahul Gandhi’s aggression is NOT targeted at Modi. It is actually targeted at his own so-called allies.
Sounds crazy? Allow me to explain.
The first thing to understand is that Maharashtra and Haryana’s results have finally put to rest any hopes the dynasty and its brown noses had of the loot resuming soon. If you notice, the tone of prominent media coolies and YouTube servant army has changed. It’s 2029 now, barring black swan events. So it’s now a longer-term game.
While researching for this article, I was somewhat surprised to discover that the dotted alliance has 37 parties! Anyway most of them are of no consequence even in any one state. Many of them have leaders that don’t even have Wiki pages of their own! How many of you know G. Devarajan of the Forward bloc? I will be happy to admit I didn’t. Only a few matter and it should be obvious that practically all of them, barring the communists, are dynastic shopfronts.
This is where Rahul and his sister are facing a big issue – they are caught in a catch-22 situation. The alliance has become the single biggest obstacle in growing the party and reviving its past glory. And yet giving up on it is even worse – at least at this point in time. Because that will reduce Congress to total irrelevance in even more states. He has no choice but to wreck it from within. Of of
The good news is that there is no one among the ‘partners’ that can challenge Rahul Gandhi for the PM chair among the various dynasts. Most are content to live off the takings from one state. Mamata Banerjee and Arvind Kejriwal are wildcards but you can still argue it will be an uphill challenge for them.
The bad news is that each of them and all of them together are making sure Rahul Gandhi can never get there. Not just in state polls, where the regional and one-state parties have a good claim to grabbing most seats and ensuring their survival, but even in national elections. AAP didn’t give any in Punjab, communists none in Kerala and TMC zilch in Bengal. Stalin was a bit generous in TN, hoping perhaps having the Center on his side was worth the price, and so was Akhilesh in UP – 17 seats. Which many felt was way too much and they were right – Congress’s success rate was far lower than SP’s. In states where there are no regional parties like RJ, GJ, MP or CG, the BJP is way too strong even if it suffers a setback here and there. Ignoring RJ, the dotted alliance won only 2 seats between the other three states, out of 65!
If you look at the long term, Rahul Gandhi (58 in 2029) faces very little challenge from Modi – who will be almost 80 in 2029. And there is no obvious successor in sight. But the challenge posed to him by Akhilesh (55), Kejriwal (60) or even Tejaswi (40!) will last as long as his own political career can last, if not longer. Mamata may be 73 in 2029 but if she can destroy Rahul’s chances in 2029, that is good enough as by then it will be beyond retrieval. Even India Today or Ravish Pandey may give up on launching him or declaring him as arrived and ready. Priyanka Vadra can also forget about passing the throne to her son one day.
These dynasties are not at all naive like Uddhav / Aditya Thackeray to commit political harakiri and pay obeisance at the Palazzo. They play the game as good as any and as hard as any. Look at how cleverly Omar Abdullah has positioned himself, after winning the polls under his own steam. If Modi were as accommodative as ABV, he would have joined NDA.
You can argue that Congress and the First Family are stuck in a rut – they are forever at the mercy of the allies, getting either nothing or table scraps. And to make matters worse, the Pidi media often rants at Congress for not being “generous” – shorthand for “why can’t you win and help us redeem IOUs accumulated over ten-plus years of brown-nosing for next to nothing?”
Any “victory” with this set of partners will at best be pointless and worst, completely out of reach. Only a total collapse of BJP in states where there is no dotted partnership – like the ones I listed above, will give Congress decent enough seats to demand the PM chair without looking childish. Even if that happens, it will only reinforce my point – that Modi is not Rahul’s biggest issue. Because Congress is the default Plan B for voters in these states if they tire of BJP or Modi. It will fall on his lap.
With this being the case, if I were Soros, Politburo or the deep state, I would be worried. This state of affairs must change. As I have mentioned in other articles, the woke left in the USA and the Stalinist left in India have complete trust only in Rahul Gandhi. At this point the Stalinists don’t even mind that they can’t win anymore – Rahul winning is just as good, for their Polpotist pogrom on Sanatana Dharma or for Beijing’s plan for South Asia. In fact, they can end the farce and merge their party with Congress. The ecosystem cannot trust any of the other dynasts who do not hate Sanatana dharma, not obedient to the deep state ecosystem and are not reliably woke.
I am sure Rahul is being told to up his game and try to grab more minds and vote share from his own allies as they are an easier grab than going after hardcore Modi voters. If not their investments over the years will go up in smoke like Iran’s did in Syria. The return of UPA with Mamata or Akhilesh or someone else at the helm is as good as nothing for the global Soros-woke ecosystem. The only way Congress can go back to its glory days is to recover at least in UP, Bihar and WB.
So what can Rahul do, short of disbanding the alliance and openly declaring he will take on BJP by himself and aim for 400+ seats his father once had?
Over-reliance on the minority vote has reached a point of negative return. Although the recent Palestine tote bag drama of Priyanka Vadra seems to indicate that the lesson has not been learnt, I think it must have sunk in. You can only get 100%. 120% or 200% is not possible. That much mathematics should be within even Rahul’s grasp. I guess these farcical gestures are simply to keep that 100% safe since others are pecking at it too – who? Modi? So-called allies of course! Do you get the point?
It is also interesting to note that where the alliance ‘partner’ is secure that the M-vote won’t desert them, Congress gets the short end of the stick – like in WB or JK. Where the current leaseholder of the M-vote is insecure – like in UP where Akhilesh wasn’t that sure, he could be arm-twisted into giving 17 seats. Where it hardly matters – like TN – Congress gets thrown crumbs. This should explain the love affair with Palestine and Islamist agendas.
Delhi is an interesting case where Kejriwal seems to think he is like Mamata Didi – he can tell Rahul off and yet keep it – time will tell. If he loses, Kejriwal’s national ambition will be toast for the rest of his career, and Akhilesh and Tejaswi will be scared to death – they know their political base can be wiped out unless they kowtow at 10JP. Those are big states. And well worth playing for keeps.
Thus this aggression ensures that Congress and the Crown Prince are always on the news, occupying the front pages, edging out others that can pose a challenge.
