The political history of the state of Rajasthan, in its present form, is closely interwoven with that of the Indian National Congress.
Though in the years since independence, Rajasthan has also been a proving ground for the Swatantra party and its people have embraced the BJP, as an alternative, and voted it into power on fouroccasionsnevertheless the Congress remained in a pole position. Rajasthan is a two party political fray. There have been multiple attempts at forming a third front but none could prove successful. No other political formation has nearly been as central to Rajasthan’s past and present as the Congress.
But, will it be so in the future?
The Congress, led the freedom struggle and the people’s movements in various princely states and won us independence. It laid the foundations for legislative democracy. As the original party in power, it encompassed every shade of public opinion and gave representation to the full spectrum of communities in the state. Its electoral dominance was based on a concrete set of achievements in the social as well as political sphere. It could claim credit for industrial growth, land reforms, growth of basic infrastructure, extension of educational facilities and provision of public services. There was a fullstress on pro poor programs and redistributive justice. The political system was managed well andMohan LalSukhadiaremained Chief Minister for an unbroken 17 years.
The Congress split in 1969. Indira Gandhi began to act against the old guard labelling them as conservative reactionaries. It amounted to a radicalisation of the Congress and led to the centralisation of power. A true ‘high command’ emerged. In Rajasthan, the new Congress leadership took place of the old but the caste equations were generally kept in place. Like elsewhere, the Congress party atrophied due to a command and control type authoritarian set up. This cost the party dearly when its uninterrupted rule of three decades endedin 1977 and the Janata Party an amalgam of the Jana Sangh, BharatiyaLok Dal, Congress O and the Socialist party rose to power. It won 151 of the 200 seats in the Rajasthan assembly.
On the national stage, it was a blow from which the Congress never truly recovered. The anti-Congress coalition politics eventually paved the road to Delhi for the BJP led NDA and then the BJP’s single party majority victories in 2014 and 2019
In Rajasthan, despite the definitive changes in politics, economics and social realities the Congress adapted and carried on. It remained one out of the two alternatives that could be voted into power. Unlike in most states of the Hindi heartland where the Congress party was nominally alive, in Rajasthan its presence on ground was disarrayed but never destroyed.
When we look back in history, the most significant moment for the post Indira Congress was 6th December, 1992 at the Babri Masjid in Ayodhya. It marked the shift in the centre of gravity in Indian politics. It was a movement that led the BJP to become the party with energy and elevated it to power at the centre in 1998. The Ayodhya Ram temple movement redefined politics especially in North India. It spiralled out of the control of the Congress party. It made religious identity key to politics. In Rajasthan, Congress never recovered its ideological credentials. It was here onwards solely an ‘Anti BJP’ alternative.
This mix of over centralisation, weakening on ground presence, rabid factionalism, smaller residual fiefdoms, erosion of the politics of policies and ideologies was generically true for the Congress and specifically true of the party in Rajasthan. The importance given to personal loyalty disabled the formation of a critical mass of effective leaders on ground. Lack of localisation of talentweakened the organisational fibre. Large chunks of its base were cannibalised by the BJP. Anticipations of revival were high, whatever may have been the probability, when the Gehlot government was sworn in with Pilot as deputy. But the advantage was totally frittered away with no delivery to show. The role of the organization was minimised or de-clutched from government.
To my mind, it is a remarkable feature of Congress tacticsthat it has learnt to be flexible to emerging situations only by moving away from ideology! What doesit stand for? They cannot give aconvincing answer excepting mouthing clichés on secularism and social justice. The BJP, in contrast, has both ideology and strategy.
The Congress should think hard and rightly blame itself.
It shouldn’t have come to this.