Patna (Bihar): The Congress is faced with a herculean task in Bihar assembly polls. In the absence of a fine-tuned set of policies, intent and leadership, the party is not able to strike a balance between its political turf and support base.
For Congress, things are not under control. If the party leaders try to fix one set of problems, another set of problems crops up. This piquant situation has left most Congress leaders in Bihar struggling.
The party has entirely thrown its weight behind the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) led by Tejashwi Yadav. To put it differently, the Congress is solely dependent on the RJD for its electoral prospects in Bihar. However, this is not something new as far as the Congress and Bihar politics is concerned. The situation has been the same since 1990.
With the Congress having no option but to be left at the mercy of the RJD, even the national leaders of the party are forced to dance to the tune of RJD's policies. The grand old party's own ideas and policies have taken the backseat.
Campaigning for the first phase of Bihar's 2020 Assembly polls is coming to end now. In this phase, 71 Assembly seats will go to polls out of which the Congress has put up its candidate on 21 seats. In 2015, when the JDU and the RJD had fought the assembly election together, the Congress had contested in 13 seats in the first phase of the poll and had won nine seats.
Read: Tejashwi's growing popularity a threat to NDA
In the changed scenario, the Congress has got more seats and a bigger role to play, but the party has lost its support base in due course of time. Chief Minister Nitish Kumar's development plank and the BJP's social engineering, have captured a major chunk of the political space and seats in the state. The Congress could not reorient itself accordingly. The party leadership has put the onus to win the Assembly polls on the state unit. The Central leadership has not given as much importance and weightage to the state assembly polls as was required.
Absence of senior leaders
The Congress is contesting the 2020 Assembly polls in Bihar on a total of 70 seats. In the 2015 Assembly polls, Congress did not have to worry much as JDU leader Nitish Kumar and RJD boss Lalu Prasad Yadav were in command of things. The Congress war room was directly or indirectly implementing what was being decided by the Yadav and Kumar duo. In fact, the Congress had not been able to oppose the candidates decided by Kumar.
In 2015 Assembly polls, the Congress had won 27 seats, which was the party's best performance after 1989. However, in the first phase of polling in Bihar 2020, the Congress has not been able to consolidate itself in terms of its policies and principles. The preparation was not in tune with the expectations of the workers. The party candidates had hoped that their seniors would campaign for them in the first phase of polling, but that did not happen.
Sonia, Rahul, Priyanka did not pay enough attention
The Congress had a large number of candidates in the fray for the first phase of polling, but the top leadership could not live up to what the candidates had hoped. The Congress in Bihar has left everything to Tejashwi Yadav's policies and his preparations for the poll. In the 2015 elections, when the Congress was contesting in alliance with the RJD and the JDU, the heavyweights of the Congress also had a lot of rallies and other meetings in Bihar.
Read: Bihar polls: 'Brand Tejashwi' vs NDA
Sonia Gandhi had six election rallies. Rahul Gandhi also had a number of rallies and put forth his views in a bid to woo the voters. However, this time around, all the top leaders of the Congress have not been actively participating. Except for Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Bhupesh Singh Baghel and Rahul Gandhi, most of the big leaders who were supposed to campaign in the election could not come, at least not in the first phase of polling.
State leadership not strong
The executive committee of the Bihar Congress is also not as strong as it used to be in 2015. There are a lot of questions related to the coordination committee and other party units. There are many issues between the Congress and the RJD alliance as well. In 2015, Ashok Chaudhary was the state unit president of the Congress, who is now the state executive president of the JDU. Ashok Chaudhary had made the Congress strong and gave a direction to the party.
However, the current state unit Congress president wasted most of his time for the State Legislative Council elections and did not get enough time for the Vidhan Sabha elections. Bihar election in-charge Shakti Singh Gohil has definitely taken the responsibility along with Randeep Singh Surjewala. The Congress candidates had a lot of expectations from their seniors, but in vain. The RJD has to take care of the Congress candidates as well to ensure that the dignity of the alliance is maintained.
Read: 'Farewell for Nitish day after Lalu leaves jail on Nov 9'
The Congress in alliance with the RJD could have scripted a better electoral chapter of success in the changed political scenario of 2020, but the weakness of leadership, non-seriousness of the national president, discord among big leaders, tensions within the party – have all contributed in creating the situation in which the Congress finds itself today.
The leadership of the state is also struggling with many issues. In fact, the Congress is not in a position to do much for its own candidates. To make matters worse, the situation has reached such a level that due to lack of discipline, Income Tax raided the party office at the Sadaqat Ashram and illegal money was seized from the vehicles.
Whatever the Congress may say about corruption and target the BJP, the way in which the leaders of the Congress are caught in legal trouble, is not a good omen for the party. It remains to be seen how the Congress, which failed to make the most in the first phase of polling, makes up the loss in terms of planning and campaigning during the second the third phases of polling.
