While Congress had kick started the political career for Mevani, he has done precious little for the party so far, and not everyone is happy with his induction and the prominence that is being accorded to him by the high command, which is yet to appoint a state incharge, or even a state committee, which was dissolved back in 2019.However, the high command of the party seems to think otherwise and hopes to reap the benefit of social engineering much like its genius Madhavsinh Solanki, who had scripted the record of winning 149 out of 182 seats in the 1985 election through famous social engineering of KHAM, ie. Kshatriya, Harijan, Adivasi, Muslim. Even after winning Gujarat comprehensively for five terms in a row, the BJP (Bharatiya Janata Party) still pines for a show to surpass that.But in Solanki’s achievement also lay the nemesis of Congress in the state as it stood permanently alienated from the upper castes, who went on to fuel the rise of BJP in the state in the 90s. For Congress, the glorious days of governance were over.Identity politics has not proved fruitful for Congress in Gujarat since the 80s, and with the BJP surreptitiously eating into its dedicated voter bases over the years, the party has found itself more reacting to the evolving scenarios in Gujarat than creating its own discourse. The only time it managed some semblance of benefit from the bubbling community cauldron in the state was in 2017, when, in the aftermath of the Patidar agitation, the BJP was reduced to a double-digit figure in the state Assembly. But that was a windfall that came from the wrath of the Patidar community against the ruling dispensation.However, after four monsoons and a government gone, Congress finds itself back at where it all began, or perhaps in a little more precarious state than before. While it failed to capitalise fully on the Patidar anger, the state is now seeing a steady growth of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), particularly among the Patidar voters.If the Surat civic body election saw a wipe-out of the Congress, it was AAP that emerged as the choice as opposition, particularly among the Patidars, and the community’s dalliance with the debutant party is only continuing.Congress’ efforts to induct the rebel young faces of community anger, like Hardik Patel and Alpesh Thakore, too did precious little for it. While it had inducted Thakore and made him the co-incharge of Bihar along with Shaktisinh Gohil in 2017 along with a position in the AICC, Thakore soon paid back his benefactors by shifting allegiance to the BJP after voting for the saffron party’s Rajya Sabha candidate in 2019. He, however, lost in the ensuing by-election from Radhanpur.Hardik Patel, the other Young Turk who was made the working president of Gujarat Congress, has so far been busy in building his image across the state and is not seen in any party programme. Senior leaders of the party admit that Patel is yet to learn to play for the team in the state that is due for election in about 15 months.Not everyone is happy with the experiments of the party. “We used to be a party for everyone without our community identity becoming the biggest determining factor. But this is a trend that is only narrowing our base and serving the agenda set by others,” said a senior Congress leader. “We are only responding to situations without pushing the ruling party to answer for its deeds.
Source: Economic Times
