Can The Congress Ever Revive From Here?

Is it the end of the road for the Grand Old Party of India? Party leaders speak of the decline, the insipid leadership.

- Bula Devi

A text scrolling on the official website of the Indian Nat­ional Congress quotes for­mer Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh saying, “Congress is like the flowing Ganga, you can do what you feel like, you can never stop it.” But today at the Cong­ress headquarters on Akb ar Road, the mood is sombre. A senior lead­ er’s attempt to lighten it with a joke amuses nobody. “Journalists have dead­ lines; we have a deathline,” he quipped.

1. Party chief Sonia Gandhi with Rahul at a protest over suspension of MPs

2. Assam CM Tarun Gogoi offering pra y ers at a mosque on counting day

But the poor joke, made before the results of assembly elections in five states were declared this week, was prescient. The grand old party now rules barely half a dozen states. Barring Karnataka, these are small states. The writing on the wall is grim, but the party lives in a time-warp: this week, its website was still showing a Congress government in Arunachal Pradesh. “Forget winning elections, the party is unable to arrest the menacing growth of the BJP and the RSS,” a Congress leader laments, as others nod in agreement. The consensus, it seems, is: the Congress is in no position to even position itself as a rival to the BJP.