FROM THE EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
Rahul Gandhi is an unusual figure in Indian politics. He is a ‘Nepo Baby’ like many others, but the mantle of a political leader didn’t really sit well on him. He gave the impression that he had been conscripted into politics because of his distinguished lineage, one that boasts three prime ministers. Helped by his frequent foreign jaunts and the troll armies of the opposition, he was caricatured as a non-serious political dilettante. Ever since his early years, he has flattered to deceive. He arrived like a kind-hearted young prince awaiting a natural coronation, exuding a fresh charm that saw choruses of approval. But his claim to represent a force for the good was first deflated by the India Against Corruption movement against his party’s UPA-II government. The movement captured the public imagination with its self-appointed task of ethical cleansing. As it enlarged the anti-Congress space, Narendra Modi moved in like a tsunami, and the rest was history. The Congress, quite literally, very nearly became history. In 2014, it got its lowest ever tally of 44 seats in the Lok Sabha. Rahul was anointed Congress president in December 2017, succeeding his mother Sonia Gandhi. The subsequent general election in 2019 saw another humiliating defeat where the party won only 52 seats. Rahul took a moral stand and resigned as president, but was de facto running the party, with all major decisions needing his nod. Thereafter, the party limped along from one internal crisis to another. The smell of failure surrounded him and his party. The image cast on him was that of a ‘Pappu’—one characterised by naivete. That is the prison of perceptions the Bharat Jodo Yatra (BJY) now seeks to shatter. Rahul is in the final leg of one of the most remarkable political exercises undertaken post-Independence. By the time you read this, he would have crossed 13 Indian states and entered Jammu and Kashmir, having covered the entire 3,200-odd km from Kanyakumari on foot. Rahul has stayed the course, displaying a stoic inner resolve, shedding the image of a reluctant political dabbler. Mind you, a padayatra is not a unique phenomenon in Indian politics. The Janata Party politician Chandra Shekhar had famously undertaken one in 1983 and, in 2003, the late Andhra strongman YSR had traversed the boondocks of the still-united state. Murli Manohar Joshi, as BJP president, did a Kanyakumari-to-Kashmir yatra in 1991, though mostly by car.
The BJY has been swaddled in goody-goody slogans about how it’s an ‘ideological’ gesture—a tapasya, even—meant to conquer hatred with love. Rahul may be being genuinely himself when he says disarmingly, “Nafrat ke bazaar mein mohabbat ki dukaan khol raha hoon.” But make no mistake. The political imperatives that have driven the Congress pantheon off their teak roundtables to these dusty highways are very dire. It ruled just two states on its own till Himachal Pradesh fell into its lap. The sense of severe attrition was accentuated as AAP occupied more and more space, in Punjab and even Gujarat last year. Within the party, a cavalcade of leaders headed for greener pastures, and the ‘G23’ band of dissidents raised visions of outright implosion. The Congress simply had to do something to show it was not ready for the mortuary yet—something out of the box. Thus, from the gloomy trenches of the Udaipur chintan shivir last May, the idea of a pan-India yatra was born.
Throughout the yatra, Rahul refrained from indulging in electoral politics; conspicuously, the yatra even avoided poll-bound Gujarat. Instead, he focused on three main issues—social/communal strife, wealth inequities and political authoritarianism. He visibly touched a chord with those who feel the BJP’s rule has an authoritarian edge, galvanising the party cadre and leadership that are usually comatose when out of power, and filling social media with slickly produced, warm images of him hugging and smiling at all and sundry. He seemed to be in his element and enjoying himself. The results were encouraging: his YouTube handle gained over 21 million new views on an average every month since the yatra began in September 2022. He has so far denied direct access to mainstream media, claiming it was biased against him. He did hold occasional press meets en route, reiterating his main themes, but offered no solutions. Rahul Gandhi is no Vinoba Bhave. Ultimately, the goal of a politician is to gain power to further an agenda or ideology. Being smart on social media, taking the moral high ground or touchy-feely politics are not enough to get votes. You need clarity in what you offer the electorate and a matching trust from them that you can deliver.
Apitched battle is on to claim the future of Indian politics. If Rahul aims to be a prime combatant, the yatra will finally have to be tested on this plane. The question we ask is: Is It Making a Difference? Three of the big states he has covered—Karnataka, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh—are bound for polls this year, along with Chhattisgarh and five others. The Congress is a genuine player in all the four named, with a reasonable shot at power, but is hobbled by intense internal feuds. Neither Rahul nor the party leadership has addressed these issues. Right now, the whole focus of the party brass is to make the yatra a success. There are other objective criteria by which his makeover can be judged, even before state election results give it to us in black and white. And the figures are intriguing. In an india todayCVoter poll, those surveyed were asked to give their assessment of the Bharat Jodo Yatra. While 29 per cent of them believed it was a great exercise for mass connect, a substantial 36.8 per cent, while concurring that the yatra had created a buzz, believed the party didn’t have the organisational muscle and leadership to win elections. The big message: doing a yatra is not enough, the Congress must focus on revamping its organisational structure to challenge the BJP. Another CVoter tracker, which asked respondents whether they were satisfied with Rahul’s performance as a leader, revealed the yatra has made a perceptible difference to his personal popularity. From last January’s slump of 40.4 per cent, he had zoomed to 50 per cent on the New Year of 2023. But this is still below the 54.6 per cent he enjoyed on the same date in 2019. More importantly, when asked for their choice of prime minister, an overwhelming majority of 60.6 per cent plumped for Modi—higher than the 54.3 per cent he registered last January. Rahul, by contrast, improved only marginally: from 28.4 per cent last January to 29.9 per cent now.
The Congress seems focused on not losing the momentum, with a ‘Haath Se Haath Jodo Yatra’ planned to stir up action down to the booth level on January 26, just before the BJY culminates on January 30. Group Editorial Director Raj Chengappa and Executive Editor Kaushik Deka travelled separately to see the BJY in different states. As they observe, the party will need more than optics: for one, a concrete alternative policy articulation on the issues Rahul has raised. If the whole objective of the BJY was to rebrand Rahul Gandhi, it has probably succeeded for the time being. But much depends on what he does afterwards. If he can, on the back of his rebranded image, revitalise the Congress, all the toil would have been worth it. Otherwise, his walkathon will be just like a long walk of self-discovery in the park.