New Delhi: Substantive changes are at work currently to energise the Congress from below, former Uttarakhand chief minister and senior Congress leader Harish Rawat said, adding that the positive results of steps like an organisational reshuffle and fixing accountability may show in the next few months.
In a detailed interview with The Wire, Rawat spoke about a number of issues plaguing the Congress but expressed confidence in the leadership trio of Rahul Gandhi, Priyanka Gandhi and Mallikarjun Kharge to make the organisation battle-ready.
He also spoke about why he believed that unless INDIA bloc partners treat the Congress as the core of the opposition alliance and support it in its historical fight against the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), they will end up benefiting the BJP indirectly.
Curiously, he also said that the BJP’s move to implement a uniform civil code (UCC) in Uttarakhand attacks the very basis of the family systems and Hindu traditions of his state, as he believed that a UCC will destabilise the Hindu joint family system in more ways than one, while also opening ways for “outsiders” to uproot people living in the state for centuries.
“The best part of the latest Congress working committee meeting [in Belgaum] is that the Congress president has fixed accountability in all positions. The output of position holders will be examined in the context of their states. I am happy that Kharge ji has also concentrated on revamping the district units,” he said.
“There was a time in the Congress when the district president position was considered very prestigious. I was also once a district president and that experience helped me a lot even in my later years. We must understand that if district units become stronger, then all other parts of the body will also become strong,” he said.
‘Party’s leadership strong but constructive work, ideology have been weak’
Rawat said that delivering social justice to the marginalised sections has always been the Congress’s ideological platform. “We can’t imagine a Bharat without social justice,” he said.
Referring to the new Congress slogan ‘Jai Bapu, Jai Ambedkar, Jai Samvidhan’, the Congress leader said, “This is not merely a slogan; it is our philosophy, it is in our hearts. The challenge is to spread the message as deep as possible.”
He said that after its Udaipur Declaration, the party has seen marked shifts towards representing backward communities and Dalits in the organisation, something that he believes is the way to go forward if the Congress has to defeat the BJP.
Rawat said that the Congress has historically relied on three factors – leadership, constructive work and ideological platform. He said that while leadership in the form of the Gandhis and Kharge appears very strong, the other two fronts have been relatively weak in recent years.
“We need to give a solid ideological front to our leadership and create an energetic cadre to carry out constructive work in society,” Rawat said, adding that only if all three fronts work together can the Congress defeat the BJP.
Recent assembly losses, future of INDIA bloc
When asked about the recent losses in assembly elections, Rawat distinguished the loss in Maharashtra from the rest.
In what may be construed as an indirect criticism of a section of the state leadership, Rawat said, “We need to really probe the Maharashtra defeat. I feel that the referee [pointing to the Election Commission] batted for the ruling party. However, we need to seriously reflect on our losses in Chhattisgarh, Uttarakhand and Haryana. We need to ask what went wrong there, especially when the Congress was projected to emerge as a winner.”
“Only a serious and honest reflection on what went wrong will undo the mistakes we committed. That may not be an easy task but we must do it. For instance, when Uttarakhand’s loss will be discussed honestly, a lot of people may also point fingers at my role. Let it happen. But we must still go ahead with those discussions,” Rawat said.
“In Haryana, it seemed as if Tansen was about to sing a great raag, but the tanpura broke just before he began to sing,” he said.
On why the Congress celebrated the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP)’s loss in Delhi recently, Rawat said, “We believe the BJP’s victory in Delhi is a challenge for us. But what should we have done? They [the AAP] flatly refused to ally with us. I think we started our campaign very late. Had we begun our canvassing earlier, we could have secured 8-10% of the vote. We must understand that the AAP was a rival in Delhi and we needed to oppose it.”
Coming to the future of the INDIA bloc, Rawat said, “Our alliance partners should understand that no fight can be fought against the BJP without the Congress. Only the Congress, with help of its allies, can defeat the BJP, which is hollowing out our democracy and our constitution in its effort to make India a fundamentalist state.
“Our allies should understand that the Congress is the ‘Brahma Swarup’ of the alliance, while the INDIA partners are its body parts. If they don’t do that, they will end up benefiting the BJP. They should learn to keep state-level differences aside and support the Congress wholeheartedly in the national context.
“But yes, I agree that the Congress also needs to be more open-hearted with them. We need to take along even those which may have just one seat, if we want to move from 99 seats towards 300,” he said.
‘BJP seeks to change sanatan dharma from liberal theological tradition to orthodox one’
He said that the UCC is the latest experiment of the Sangh parivar in Uttarakhand, a state that it has always considered its laboratory.
“The RSS’s first ideological school was set up in Almora. I remember how [L.K.] Advani ji was distraught when the BJP lost Uttarakhand in its first elections. He did not feel so sad about similar losses in Chhattisgarh or Jharkhand.”
Rawat said, “The UCC is an attack on our diverse society and its family systems. It will pave the way for chaos in Uttarakhand and may snatch the traditional rights of people.”
He said, “Sanatan dharma is a liberal theological tradition. The BJP is hell-bent to give it an orthodox character. But they don’t understand that when religions have moved towards fundamentalism, they have become extinct. See how Buddhism spread so rapidly at one time but became a minor religion when it got appropriated by camps.”
“I firmly believe that if we have to fight the BJP, we have to take along the traditions of Sanatan dharma. Why should we hand over our faith to the BJP?” he said.
