New Delhi, Aug. 17 (The Telegraph): The victory in the Madhya Pradesh civic elections has prompted the ruling BJP to dub it a "befitting reply" to the Vyapam campaign while reminding the vanquished Congress about its lack of organisational plight and credible leadership.
The BJP elevated the local polls' importance and projected its win as a "historic success". Vinay Sahastrabuddhe, the party vice-president in charge of Madhya Pradesh and state party chief Nand Kumar Singh Chouhan addressed a news conference in the capital today and suggested the results' implications went afar.
Only once in the past has the BJP tom-tommed its victory in a local poll in such a big way. That was in 1995 when the party was on a roll in Uttar Pradesh after losing the 1993 Assembly election by a whisker. The BJP used its win to build the atmospherics for the 1996 Lok Sabha polls when it harvested a bounty from the heartland.
Today, Sahastrabuddhe said: "There was no influence of anti-incumbency because it is a continuity of the mandate we secured in 2003. Since winning that Assembly election, we succeeded in those that followed, we won every municipality and panchayat polls and we did very well in the last Lok Sabha election."
Sahastrabuddhe stressed that "these elections were held against the background of a campaign against our government and the chief minister", alluding to the recruitment scam that the Congress has used to attack chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan and Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
"The fact is that Vyapam was the result of administrative lapses. The chief minister quickly acted to wipe out its stains. But the Opposition used an artificial voice to question him. People have rejected the Opposition's charges and given a befitting reply to the Congress. The Congress said it would take the battle to the streets. Now the streets have given it the answer it deserves."
Nand Kumar, the state unit chief, said it was for the first time that a national party like the Congress was "reduced" to holding just one municipal panchayat.
The BJP gloated over the fact that the Congress was trounced in Gwalior, said to be the fief of Rahul Gandhi confidant Jyotiraditya Scindia, and in Raghogarh, home to Congress veteran Digvijaya Singh who has been one of the loudest voices against Chouhan and Modi and on almost every issue.
Jyotiraditya, the MP from Guna, adjoining Gwalior, mostly spearheaded the protests in the recent monsoon session of Parliament.
Also, Nand Kumar pointed out that the electorate of 25 lakh in last week's civic elections was spread across the state, and fairly evenly in towns and villages. "Therefore, the verdict is representative of the mood across Madhya Pradesh," he claimed.
Chief minister Chouhan , with a crack team comprising ministers Manoranjan Mishra, Rampal Singh, Bhoopender Singh and Gyan Singh and party general secretary (organisation) Arvind Menon, ran a counter-campaign against the Congress that began by "educating" cadres on the "facts" of Vyapam and supplying talking points. "Quite a few of our workers had doubts that we had to clarify fast," a state BJP source said.
What helped was a perception that Chouhan had turned around agriculture and power supply, winning him new voters in rural and urban areas.
Sources said Chouhan had made the elections a matter of prestige. "He had to prove to Modi and Amit Shah (the BJP president) that he is the leader who still matters in Madhya Pradesh," a source said.
Indeed, there is a growing belief in the BJP that Madhya Pradesh is acquiring the kind of cult cachet that Gujarat had under Modi.
The upbeat mood contrasted with the disappointment in the Congress camp, with most leaders believing they couldn't hope for a revival merely because of Vyapam. They conceded there was little resistance to the BJP at the grassroots and the fragmented Congress leadership made no attempt to exploit the negative sentiments generated by the massive recruitment scam.
The Congress's official reaction was on obvious lines. Spokesperson R.P.N. Singh said: "Our campaign for justice in Vyapam wasn't for electoral gains. It is indisputable that lakhs of students have been affected by the scam. You can't link our fight with the results of the municipal elections."
Several Congress workers said the situation on the ground was pathetic and seniors were not willing to take charge unless the hierarchy was clearly defined and one person was projected as the boss.
"The workers are demoralised and completely confused. They are still grappling with the key question - who is in command? Digvijaya Singh or Jyotiraditya? Rahul Singh or Suresh Pachauri?" a former minister said over phone from Bhopal.
The irony is that state unit chief Arun Yadav, a young OBC face handpicked by Rahul Gandhi, is learnt to have given up. "Arun Yadav was never empowered and he couldn't have succeeded anyway amid the big guns. Unless Rahul resolves the leadership question with veterans like Kamal Nath, Digvijaya, Jyotiraditya, Satyavrat Chaturvedi and Rahul Singh... the party will remain rudderless in Madhya Pradesh," a former MP said.
Seniors in Delhi also admitted lofty rhetoric was no substitute for organisational strength and no initiative had so far been taken to address this concern despite 15 months having passed since the last general election in which the Congress got a drubbing.
Many state leaders are upset that the high command seemed entirely focused on grabbing headlines by attacking Prime Minister Modi.
There are states where new a leadership structure has been developed, though. Chhattisgarh, for instance, has shown encouraging results as the Congress has won most local polls in the recent past. In Rajasthan, Sachin Pilot has been given full authority as state unit chief and the party there is in better shape. Former chief minister Ashok Gehlot appears to have fallen in line.
Maharashtra and Delhi are other examples, with Ashok Chavan and Ajay Maken having been unambiguously declared the leaders.
In poll-bound Bihar, though, the Congress has been a fringe player for over two decades but nothing has been done to regain ground in the key state. The state unit in Punjab - which will go to polls in January-February 2017 - is also in crisis despite the ground realities suggesting a clear advantage for the Congress.
These problems suggest Madhya Pradesh is not the only state where the recent hype around Rahul Gandhi's combativeness has failed to yield results. Other states may have similar tales to tell.
