The Madhya Pradesh unit of Congress seems to have lost interest in spreading its own ideology, as the once-active Gandhi Chaupals have remained defunct since Jitu Patwari took charge as State Congress president in April 2024.
The Chaupals were launched in the run-up to the 2023 Assembly elections with an aim of countering the BJP’s outreach machinery and strengthening Congress at the grassroots. Established mostly in villages, they provided a forum where party workers discussed Congress ideology alongside Mahatma Gandhi’s philosophy of village sustainability. Senior leaders regularly visited these gatherings, sharing experiences and reviving the spirit of the party’s historical legacy.
The initiative was seen as an important attempt to build an ideological connect and mobilize workers ahead of the elections. Even after the polls, the Gandhi Chaupals continued to function, keeping alive a dialogue between the party’s leadership and cadre.
However, according to Madhya Pradesh Congress Ideology Department head Bhupendra Gupta, things changed after the leadership transition earlier this year. With Patwari’s appointment as State president, the Chaupals were neglected and eventually stopped functioning. “The Gandhi Chaupals played a crucial role earlier, but now nobody is paying attention to them. At present, the party is only considering new programmes,” Gupta told The Pioneer.
Party insiders admit that abandoning the Chaupals has created a vacuum in the Congress’s ideological outreach. What once helped workers feel connected to the leadership has now been replaced by uncertainty over the party’s direction in Madhya Pradesh.
The development also raises questions about the Congress’s seriousness in maintaining its ideological base at a time when the BJP continues to strengthen its booth-level structure and push its narrative aggressively. For many observers, the fading of Gandhi Chaupals reflects an organizational fatigue in the state Congress, which is struggling to rebuild itself after successive electoral defeats.
Gupta maintained that the party is working on alternatives. He said new initiatives are being planned to carry forward the ideology of the Congress and Gandhi’s message, though no concrete programme has yet been announced.
For now, the silence of Gandhi Chaupals underscores a larger reality—that the Madhya Pradesh Congress, once eager to project its ideological identity, no longer seems equally invested in sustaining it.