<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
It would seem that in the run up to the assembly elections in Maharashtra and Haryana, the BJP will be coasting to a comfortable win in the two states primarily because there is either no opposition or because the opposition is divided. Opposition to the BJP comes mainly from the regional parties and not the Congress. The prospects for the Congress in key states like Maharashtra and Haryana where the party was a major force up to 2013, look bleak in the run-up to the assembly elections. The Congress has been reduced to a number four party in Maharashtra and could just win one seat in the Lok Sabha polls. The question is whether the Congress will take any lessons out of this Lok Sabha 2019 debacle?. Right now it does not seem that they are doing any course correction. Though its undisputed leader Rahul walked out of the presidentship of the party, yet he will lead the campaign in both states. It reveals that the party cannot come out of the “Nehru-Gandhi family limited company”. A capable man like Pranab Mukherjee was never trusted by Sonia Gandhi. Nor do Rahul or Priyanka look inclined to put a strong-willed leader at the helm. The Congress workers and leaders too don’t seem to be looking beyond Priyanka Gandhi, in case Rahul Gandhi is to be replaced (a taboo word for the Congress). The grip of the Sonia loyalists in the Congress high command is still strong. The ‘high command’ continues to cling dearly to the rule that seniority and dynasty are preferred over youth and talent. This was proved in the selection of Ashok Gehlot as CM of Rajasthan and Kamal Nath as CM of Madhya Pradesh, over Sachin Pilot and Jyotiraditya Scindia respectively. The fight is again going to be Modi versus the rest( or whatever remains). Though joblessness has risen to a record high, farm incomes plummeted and industrial production slumped and most Indians hit hard by demonetisation ( designed to flush out undeclared wealth), and complaints about what critics said was a poorly-designed and complicated GST; yet Modi’s popularity appears to be unfazed. Even presently, the Congress does not have an equivalent of Modi’s emotional Hindu-nationalism-national security message. In the 2019 Lok Sabha election, Congress had a potential winner in the Nyay scheme but party leaders failed to highlight it and also it came too late in the day. That itself indicates how the Congress has lost its bearings and is adrift and rudderless. The tag of corruption and dynastic politics are heavy millstones on the neck of the Congress from which it needs to shake off. Those in the party’s driver’s cabin- the Congress high command- appear not to see the road ahead, focussed as they are, with being in the party’s sanctum sanctorum. The inability of the Congress to take course correction is the single reason for its continuing irrelevance. Rahul may attack Modi but it would be futile. Modi’s second successive landslide win echoes Ronald Reagan’s abiding popularity as US president in the 1980s, when Reagan somehow escaped blame for his country’s economic woes. Reagan was called the Great Communicator and for being a “teflon” president whose mistakes never stuck to him. Modi enjoys a similar reputation. Thus, the elections will be about Modi and even if he has turned Indian elections more presidential.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Strapped to the past<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[685],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-208148","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-editorial"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/208148","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=208148"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/208148\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=208148"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=208148"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=208148"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}