Despite several attempts to woo the Dalits, the Congress was defeated in all the four States that went to polls recently. Out of the 12 reserved seats in Delhi, it got only one. The party won none of the 34 reserved seats for the Scheduled Castes in Rajasthan, and only four from the 35 in Madhya Pradesh
The Congress is all set to play its ‘secular’ card in the country, primarily with an eye on the Muslim voter-bank. Keeping this objective in mind, party vice-president Rahul Gandhi has visited Muzaffarnagar twice and actively pushed the Anti-Communal Violence Bill in Parliament. In the meantime, the Congress is busy firming up its alliances with other parties. In Bihar, the RJD, lJP and NCP are set to ally with it; and in Jharkhand, the JMM is already a part of the UPA. Pyarimohan Mohapatra’s Odisha Jan Morcha and Tamil star Vijayakanth’s DMDK are also likely to ally with the Congress. The parties in Maharashtra, Kerala, Uttar Pradesh and Jammu & Kashmir will resume their associations. And after the lok Sabha elections, YS Jaganmohan Reddy and K Chandrashekhar Rao are expected to join the Congress in Andhra Pradesh.
The party is also relying big on its Dalit agenda. Just before the Assembly elections in four States, Rahul Gandhi had left no stone unturned to win over the Dalits; he even gave former Dalit IAS officer K Raju an important position in the party. Taking the agenda further, Rahul has attacked BSP leader Mayawati sever times, accusing her of making the Dalits her ‘slaves’. He has also held several meetings with Dalit and tribal leaders to discuss the manifesto of the party. Despite these efforts, the Congress was defeated in all the four States. Out of the 12 reserved seats in Delhi, it got only one. The party won none of the 34 reserved seats for the Scheduled Castes in Rajasthan, and only four from the 35 in Madhya Pradesh. Nevertheless, the Congress leaders believe that Rahul’s Dalit agenda will become successful by the time the lok Sabhaelections are held.
The PM race begins
With the growing feeling that the 2014 lok Sabha elections will have a hung Parliament, several names are being speculated for the Prime Minister’s post. It is also being felt that the situation will be similar to that of the 1990s when the country saw Prime Ministers like HD Deve Gowda and IK Gujral. Also, in a first, the Congress has said that it will announce its prime ministerial candidate this time. Reportedly, Rahul Gandhi’s name may be announced in the AICC session on January 17. The names of Sushil Kumar Shinde and Meira Kumar are also doing the rounds. Apart from the BJP and the Congress, J Jayalalithaa of the AIADMK, Mulayam Singh Yadav of the Samajwadi Party, Mayawati of the BSP and Nitish Kumar of the JD(U) are in the race. And of course, the AAP is considering Arvind Kejriwal for the post.
BJP’s ambitious target
Almost all the leaders in the meeting of the BJP’s election campaign committee have said that Narendra Modi’s speeches have rejuvenated the masses. And hence there will be consistent rallies of Modi in the next five months. Keeping this in mind, the party plans to organise as many as 250 rallies for the Gujarat Chief Minister. In the process, the BJP is trying to cover the whole Hindi belt, western India and the Northeastern States, and has set a target of 25 crore people in attendance. The party’s arithmetic is simple: It is trying to bring in about five lakh people in each rally attended by Modi; thus, in the proposed 250 rallies, the party would be able to reach out to about 25 crore people. The BJP is trying to do everything to achieve this ambitious target.
WHO WIll rule ANDHRAIJ
It has almost become certain that N Kiran Kumar Reddy will be removed as the Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh. Reportedly, the party high command wants a leader who would be more pliant. Apart from this, the leader should also fit in the party’s caste calculus and fetch the votes of his/her caste for the Congress. Chiranjeevi seems to be the frontrunner. In the last election, he got 15 per cent votes of his own community. So, the party leaders feel that his appeal will work again and his vote-bank will be secured for the party. The Congress, meanwhile, is apprehensive on the name of any Kamma leader because TDP leader Chandrababu Naidu is also from the same community and gets substantial votes from it. If anyone from the powerful Reddy community is considered for the Chief Minister’s post, the Congress will not be much benefited because Jaganmohan Reddy is from this community. However, after taking all caste equations into consideration, the names of the State Congress president Botsa Satyanarayana, Union minister D Purandeswari and AR Reddy are also being considered.
Rahul’s quick decisions
Rahul Gandhi’s frequent changes are apparently confusing the party’s senior members. A senior leader says that when the Congress was defeated in Bihar in 2010, it took almost two years to accept the resignation of the State president, and after Uttar Pradesh’s defeat it took one year to appoint a new president. But, after the recent defeats, the party presidents of Delhi and Chhattisgarh have already been changed. It seems Rahul is suddenly acting fast. That is why several leaders in the Congress believe that there will be changes in the AICC. Sources in the party say that all those who have to fight elections may be removed from the organisation. Some of the MPs from the Rajya Sabha may be roped in for party work. Jayanthi Natarajan’s resignation from the Union Cabinet appears to be the first step in thisdirection. It is beingspeculated that Ghulam Nabi Azad and Anand Sharma will also be brought into the organisation. Probably, Anand Sharma will look after the media and Azad will shoulder the responsibility of Uttar Pradesh.