For Congress & INDIA bloc, getting past state losses no easy task
Lok Sabha polls uncertain. This also spells trouble for the newly-formed INDIA bloc, whose fate is intertwined with that of the Congress, in its fight against the Modi-led dispensation.
If the Congress continues to be deadwood against the BJP in the 200-plus LS seats where the two parties will have one-on-one fights, any good show by regional parties will not be sufficient to push up the bloc.
So, what ails the Congress? Why is it struggling to bounce back or at least make a mark? Many would point to the de facto leadership of the Gandhis and their diminishing electoral returns vis a vis the Modi factor in the 'new India' and a lack of refreshing narrative.
The Gandhis' leadership model, based on inheritance, mostly comes with all rights and no responsibilities, that insulates them from the burden of defeats and fallout of ill-fated experiments leaving the party to struggle with the consequences. Amid all the political gloom, former party president Rahul Gandhi has decided to go on yet another yatra.
This, after the poll reverses robbed Rahul — who along with sister Priyanka led the campaign — of the opportunity to credit 'anticipated victories' to his Bharat Jodo yatra and caste-census-OBC planks. How far the repackaged East-West (bus) Yatra-2 will take the party remains to be seen.
The yatra was announced even after some CWC members cautioned at the December 21 meeting that the LS poll was too close to embark on another yatra, and that it may run into BJP's build-up for the Ram temple inauguration and that Yatra-2 will lack the novelty of its first episode.
WE ARE FAMILY
While Rahul reboots for Yatra-2, Priyanka Vadra is also expanding turf.
