Cost Of Convenience

Kamal Nath as Madhya Pradesh chief embodies the limitations of Rahul Gandhis Congress

- Hartosh Singh Bal

Early in September, the Madhya Pradesh chief of the Congress, Kamal Nath, announced that if the party came to power it would build a gaushala in every panchayat in the state, which amounts to a staggering 23,412 gaushalas. A fortnight later, as the party president, Rahul Gandhi, headed to Bhopal for his first speech on the campaign trail for the state’s upcoming election, billboards of him doing a Shiva abhisheka dotted the town. For a party fighting Shivraj Singh Chouhan, a three-time incumbent chief minister of middling popularity, this seemed an odd electoral strategy—defending its own religious credentials rather than attacking the government for its failings.

The choice of Kamal Nath as party chief embodies all the Congress’s weaknesses in Madhya Pradesh—most notably, a lack of regional leadership and a serious crisis of funds—which mirror its problems nationally. Nath is known across the state but his political appeal is restricted to his parliamentary constituency of Chhindwara. During the 1984 massacre of Sikhs in Delhi, he led a murderous mob that burnt two Sikhs to death within a kilometre of parliament. Each time Gandhi tries to explain the party’s involvement in the killings, Nath’s record tarnishes his credentials.