Congress draft outlines roadmap to fight BJP: Social justice to quota, harmony to nationalism

Sources said Rahul Gandhi, in his intervention at the CWC meet, forcefully argued that the party has to step up its outreach to the Other Backward Classes (OBCs) and that it should not shy away from championing their cause. He said the party should demand reservation for deprived sections in the private sector. By reaching out to the backward, extremely backward and most backward communities, he said, the Congress can even stage an electoral comeback in Uttar Pradesh.

Rahul said the Congress should not be afraid of using the words Muslim, Christian or Sikh since these are the “minorities under attack”. Sources said the need for not antagonising the Hindu community too was flagged by a few members.

Lok Sabha MP Shashi Tharoor, sources said, spoke about the need for the party to attract voters who used to vote for the Congress but have abandoned it in the last three elections. That was the only way, he said, the party could move beyond the 19-20% vote share which the party has been getting since 2014.

Sources said Tharoor also felt the party should articulate a positive vision for the nation with a credible narrative about what it would do if voted to power rather than getting mired in negativity. He said the Congress needs to be a party of hope and aspirations which puts India ahead of sectional interests. A party of the future and not the past, he argued.

While the draft resolution which came up for discussion could undergo changes, the document, interestingly, uses the term “national harmony” instead of the oft-repeated secularism.

“India’s distinct character lies in its pluralistic culture, unparalleled diversity, and the syncretic Ganga-Jamuni Tehzeeb. Not only has Indian culture embraced diverse philosophies, thoughts and beliefs for centuries, the Constitution enshrines the right of every citizen to freely practice their faith and belief. The foundational principle of the Indian Constitution is non-discrimination – whether on the basis of religion, caste, language, place of residence, attire or food. This is the core of the Congress Party’s ideology,” the draft says in a section with the heading, “National Harmony – Equal Respect for All Faiths.”

In stark contrast, the document said, “the BJP government and its affiliates are determined to fracture this core national spirit, seek to divide, partition and bifurcate, to foster divisions on the ground of religion by pitching Hindu vs Muslim, to create language divides, to fabricate artificial discord between North India vs South India or to create caste-based rifts and divisions. The ruling (BJP-led) regime actively abets religious confrontation and attacks on minorities, particularly Muslims and Christians. The anti-conversion laws and the amendment to the law on Waqf Board are part of this polarising strategy”.

The draft asserts that “social justice forms the ideological core of the Congress”. The party has for some time been chanting the social justice mantra and vowing to open up the party’s structure to the Scheduled Castes (SCs), Scheduled Tribes (STs), OBCs and minorities.

The meet was chaired by Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge. In attendance were Sonia Gandhi, Rahul, the party’s chief ministers and top leaders from across the country. AICC general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra was absent as she is abroad. The party said she had applied for leave because of personal reasons, which was granted.

Significantly, the resolution said, “History bears witness to the fact that when the Supreme Court struck down the reservations in 1951, it was the Congress government under the leadership of Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru that enacted the first amendment to the Constitution and added Article 15(4) in the Chapter on Fundamental Rights. Henceforth, the path for reservation-based social justice was forever safeguarded.”

The resolution goes on to say that it was the Congress-led government that implemented the Mandal Commission report in 1993 and gave 27% reservation to the OBCs. While P V Narasimha Rao headed the government then, there was no mention of his name in the draft. “Not only this, the Congress government once again wrote history in 2006, by adding Article 15(5) in the Chapter on Fundamental Rights and granted 27% reservation in educational institutions to OBCs,” it said, reiterating the party’s demand for a national caste census.

The Congress also sought to reclaim nationalism and the legacy of the party’s freedom movement icons, including Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel. The CWC meeting was held at the Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel national memorial. The hoardings that the party had put up across the city and at the venue had the photographs of Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru and Patel sitting together. Symbolism was on full display as the party marked the 150th birth anniversary of Patel. It recently commemorated the 100th anniversary of Gandhi’s Congress presidency.

The draft resolution said the idea of nationalism for the Congress is one that binds the people together while the BJP/RSS’s “pseudo nationalism” seeks to divide the country and the people. The BJP/RSS model of nationalism was aimed at erasing India’s diversity, the draft alleged.

While the draft resolution waxed eloquent about nationalism, some Congress leaders who spoke during the CWC meeting had more pressing ground-level concerns. The party leaders from Kerala, which is slated for the Assembly elections next year, charged that the BJP was trying to drive a wedge between Christians and Muslims, asking the leadership to turn their attention to it. They were referring to the rift between Muslims and Christians over a piece of land in Munambam.

The party also passed a separate resolution on the “flagbearer of freedom movement – our Sardar – Vallabhbhai Patel”. In his address, Kharge spoke about a well-planned “conspiracy” against many national heroes. “An atmosphere is being created against the Congress which has a glorious history of service and struggle in the country for 140 years. This work is being done by those people who have nothing to show as their achievements. They have nothing to show as their contribution in the freedom struggle. They conspire to show the relationship between Sardar Patel and Pandit Nehru as if both the heroes were against each other. Whereas the truth is that they were two sides of the same coin. Many incidents and documents are witness to their cordial relations,” he said.

There was not much discussion on the organisation. But the Congress reiterated that it has plans to empower the district party units. “Numbers are meaningless without organisation. Numbers have no real strength without organisation,” Kharge said.

The Congress is going to have major organisational changes, AICC general secretary K C Venugopal said. “We are going to have a massive organisational reshuffle, and there will be guidelines for the same. Our general secretaries and in-charges are on it,” he said, stressing that the measures to empower the District Congress Committee (DCC) chiefs will be rolled out soon.