Can The Congress Continue Without A Nehru-Gandhi Member At The Helm?

Rahul Gandhi offered to quit as Congress president and insisted the grand old party finds a new person for the job after its defeat in the Lok Sabha election. But can the Congress look beyond the Nehru-Gandhi family at the helm?

Senior journalist Rasheed Kidwai said it's time for the Congress to stop looking into its own past. “Rahul has realised that he is a misfit and he has realised he does not have it in him to run the Congress party,” he told BloombergQuint in an interview. “As long as Rahul is there, the Congress can't succeed, and they need to let someone else try.”

But Congress sympathiser Tehseen Poonawalla said one of the Gandhi's, either Rahul or Priyanka, are required to take the party ahead at this juncture. “The 2019 poll results have been a disaster for the Congress party but Rahul Gandhi as an individual has performed better since he took charge as president.”

The Congress witnessed a massive electoral defeat in the 2019 poll. It managed to send only 52 MPs to the Lok Sabha. The party also failed to sustain its 2018 assembly victory in the Hindi heartland states of Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh. Besides, the Congress suffered a shocking defeat in Karnataka where the Bhartiya Janata Party won 25 of the 28 seats.

Poonawalla said the problem with Rahul is that he surrounded by “sycophants”. Rahul needs to be surrounded by “hardcore political animals” and a team which functions like the Prime Minister's Office and have their pulse on the ground, he said. “They cannot be running the country or the party via social media. His office is juvenile and immature. It does not reflect to be the office of somebody who aspires to be the next PM of the country. You also cannot deny that only Rahul and Priyanka were carrying the weight of this election.”

Kidwai, however, said the entire working committee of the Congress is nominated by Rahul and so if he resigns, the committee too must resign.

“All the institutions of the Congress party are hand-fed by Rahul Gandhi. Congress is in need of a shock therapy and can't be revived with this baggage. It is Rahul who went wrong with his campaign strategy and analysis. The defeat is Rahul's and it's good to see him own it up.”

Watch the full discussion here: