Why Rahul trading attacks only at Modi will benefit Congress in UP polls
Rahul Gandhi these days is sharpening his verbal attack on Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
After the "suit boot ki sarkar", "Rs 10 lakh suit", "fair and lovely" scheme to wash off the sins of his industrialist friends, Gandhi hit another one out of the park on Wednesday when he came up with the catchy one-liner: "janata trast hai, Modiji mast hain".
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— Office of RG (@OfficeOfRG) September 7, 2016
A huge crowd sitting on khaats roared in approval.
Gandhi, at this point in the campaign for the UP elections, is playing the part of the lone ranger who only has Modi in his gun sights.
After embarking on his khaat yatra, he has not once targeted rivals Mayawati and the incumbent CM, Akhilesh Yadav. The Congress's 78-year-old CM face, Shiela Dikshit is not even mentioned once by him, nor does she find space in any of the posters.
Dikshit, who is struggling valiantly to campaign, is facing an uphill task. Her campaign bus which is trundling along on UP's version of roads ensures that at its crawl speed she manages lunch at 6pm, exactly what happened when she was in Raebareli last week.
On Dikshit's Pratapgarh leg of the campaign, a restive crowd had to be kept pacified for four hours as the campaign bus inched its way to them.
These are pointers to the new sharp Congress strategy to corner the Centre, project Gandhi, and act as a vote cutter, as a senior leader wryly concedes.
Gandhi's sharp attack used the stolen cots incident to target the Centre, where he said, "poor farmers who take cots are called thieves while Vijay Mallya flees with thousands of crores of rupees and is called a defaulter".
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— Office of RG (@OfficeOfRG) September 7, 2016
Mallya's staged fleeing left the Centre with egg on its face. In Uttar Pradesh, battling agrarian distress and increasingly terrible law and order, Gandhi's dig found traction and resonance.
The Congress hopes to get enough seats to ensure it remains in the game and hopefully be part of a post-election alliance with Mayawati or even Samajwadi Party.
Remember Gandhi saying approvingly Yadav junior was a "good boy"? Yadav promptly returned the compliment.
Hardly the talk of rivals.
After 22 years in coma, a sclerotic Congress in UP is trying to walk again. While, the results of the effort are unlikely to yield much in a closely contested, fierce election, the party is fighting again.
Says a senior leader: "We are trying new things and the most politically astute state in the country is watching us keenly. They may not yet find us vote worthy enough but they are listening to us."
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| Rahul Gandhi's ongoing khaat politics. (Photo credit: AP) |
He adds: "The only silly thing we are doing is the overselling of Prashant Kishor. The whole spin is how he is re-launching India's oldest political party is overwrought and juvenile."
Interestingly, even Mayawati is training all her guns on Modi. In all her public meetings, she rakes up only the Centre's failures.
The BJP's gamble of not going with a CM face, a call taken by party president Amit Shah, has put the focus squarely on Modi. A declared CM face could have provided a handy buffer and eventual fall guy.
Gandhi's intent to corner Modi and pitch himself as his singular rival is also evident in the RSS defamation case. Gandhi's defiance and his newfound alacrity to stand trial will ensure huge political capital and reopen the most embarrassing chapter in the Sangh's history - Mahatma Gandhi's assassination by Nathuram Godse.
Gandhi's discovery of the Brahmin vote bank and today's itinerary of visiting Ayodhya by offering prayers at Hanuman Garhi temple there will make him the first Gandhi after his father to go to the temple town after the Babri Masjid demolition in 1992.
The Congress is unapologetic about embracing soft Hindutva to counter the BJP's army of sadhus and sadhvis. The AK Antony report had also said that the party was perceived as negative towards the majority community. Gandhi seems to have imbibed that rather seriously.
The BJP plans to bring Baba Ramdev to counter this soft Hindutva push, but Gandhi's newfound zeal has the party worried.
Says a senior leader: "We will not give the BJP an inch on being good Hindus. What they are doing in the name of Hindutva is nothing short of criminal - look at the gau rakshaks attacking Dalits."
Jitin Prasada has, as part of this strategy, asked for economic reservations for Brahmins. After years of neglect, UP Brahmins who form a sizeable vote bank are thrilled at the assiduous courting by the Congress and BSP. The Brahmins interest in the Congress has BJP worried as it always felt it had the upper caste vote sewn up.
In the coming days of his kisan yatra, Gandhi will speak passionately about the attack on the Dalits and Muslims and try and forge a unity between the two communities being targeted. The economic repercussions of the attack on the leather trade have a large number of UP farmers extremely worried.
With Eid around the corner and pracharak chief minister ML Khattar's plans afoot in Haryana that all biryani is to be scanned for beef, expect the ripples to spread to UP.
Teaser for tomorrow: Amit Shah's 10 point plan for the BJP.