Decisions have to be taken at local level, not from Delhi: Digvijaya Singh

Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi had lost polls too. Is there anything you can apply now from how they handled things then?

I was elected an MLA in 1977, and I happened to be the only Congress MLA in 18 districts in Malwa. The Janata Party government jailed Indira Gandhi and Sanjay Gandhi on flimsy charges that could not stand in court. But Congress persons stood behind the leadership and we fought back. There was a major split in 1978, all stalwarts left her but we stood by her. Today also, there would be people leaving. It doesn’t really matter. What matters is the political will of the leadership to draw up a roadmap for revival. We have to reinvent our socio-economic programme because the demographic profile is changing. India is becoming more urban, more middle-class. Even SCs, STs and underprivileged people have moved into the middle-class mindset. We are a mass-movement party, not a cadre-based party. We have to make the Congress a cadre-based party.

A cadre-based party has shortcomings too.

What is the BJP without the RSS? Where is the mass base left now? The mass has dwindled, so we have to go back and re-strategise our organisational structure. We have to empower the state units, district and block units down to the polling booths. Decisions have to be taken there, not from Delhi. This is what Mr Rahul Gandhi is thinking – which I think is the right thing. Today we are the only political party with an elected youth wing in every assembly segment. We can’t take decisions sitting in Delhi,because someone said “he is good” or “he is bad”. This is one of the major weaknesses of the party.

Your leadership had once said “power is poison”. Did that hurt you electorally?

Mrs Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi are two individuals who have never hankered after power. There are some people who can’t do without power, and for some power is an instrument to do political good, not simply to have it themselves. And this is what Mrs Gandhi did through UPA I and II. The RTI, the RTE, the right to work, tribal rights… the people of India got empowered. She did not empower herself. This is the basic difference between the Congress and the BJP led by Mr Narendra Modi. He is empowering himself. It’s a one-man cabinet.

Modi speaks of self-reliance and of the need for Indians to do their own thing. Is that a shift in gear for politics in India from the past rights-based decade?

He is a master of doublespeak. Why isn’t he empowering the ministers? He says, “Do your own thing.” But is he even allowing ministers or BJP leaders to do their own thing? They cant even appoint a PS or an OSD.

Why has the party disappeared from the Hindi belt?

We saw the emergence of regional and caste-based parties. In UP, we had a great opening even after the demolition of the Babri Masjid. But that fatal alliance with the BSP in 1996 meant that in 300 of the 425 assembly seats, there was no Congress flag… Congress leaders just walked out. Even now, over 80 MLAs in UP are ex-Congresspersons. In Bihar, we aligned with Lalu Prasad to keep communal forces out and were down to a level from where we could not grow. On the other side, every time the BJP went into an alliance it grew as it had a cadre. Its alliance partner was finished. The BJP is like an amarbel (parasitic creeper); it sucks all the strength from the tree that supports it. And each time the Congress has grown weak, the BJP has benefited. The Congress has been framing policies to help weaker sections, but when their votes split through communal polarisation, the Congress is the biggest loser. The Congress can’t be a party of just a Kurmi, a Yadav, a Muslim or a Brahmin or a Thakur or whatever. It’s an idea of this entire country, where every section of society feels comfortable.

With all these ideas, why did the 2014 campaign fail so miserably? Where are the foot soldiers (to convey this message)? Why did you not use the 10 years in power to fix the party?

This is my grouse. In 2004-05, the Congress president had set up a committee to look at future challenges. We sat in meetings and produced a report. And also stressed the importance of organisational discipline. The Congress became like a moving train where anyone could jump in and then jump off. We missed not having a cadre like the right-wing does, of being in every mohalla, field, road, bus stand and railway station where cadres are being trained to speak continuously about what the Congress stands for. In the last 10 years, the PM communicated very little, the Congress president spoke whenever she went out, as did the vice president. But in this 24×7 media world, the shelf-life of any idea or thought is just six to eight hours. Also, we need to react quickly on issues. We lost the perception war as the BJP could create hype, contrary to facts, that the UPA was the most corrupt government. Like on 2G or coal, very big notional losses were cited as actual. Even if our government had auctioned these resources and the exchequer had earned that money, the consumer would have had to eventually pay much greater prices for telecom and coal. Unfortunately, rumours spread by the BJP could not be countered by us.

The Janata Parivar is planning to get together. Are you hopeful?

From day one, Lohiaites have been taught to hate the Nehru-Gandhi family. Their anti-Congressism and aligning with the Jana Sangh and RSS in the past, and the BJP more recently, have made the BJP strong, so let’s see what happens. I have no problems with them coming together in an alliance, but the Congress needs to stand on its own. In our Panchmarhi meet we adopted the Ekla Chalo principle, which we reversed in Shimla. The Shimla position holds currently, but I don’t see the possibility of a nationwide alliance as of now. It will be state by state. The biggest challenge for the Congress is Bihar in 2015 and UP in 2017, with an alliance or without it. What is more important is to go back and connect with the people. The Congress has to become the agent of change and the agent to deliver relief from the problems faced by the common people.

You have already been written off from the Bihar and UP polls.

There are no short cuts in politics. The Jana Sangh waited 60 years for this stage and the RSS 90 years. They went ahead in a systematic manner.

Rahul Gandhi had said in 2012 that he would stay in UP whether he got two seats or 200. Was it a mistake that he did not stay with those issues?

I was with him when he said it. I wish he had. Rahul Gandhi is a very intense person and whatever he does, he takes very seriously. He is a voracious reader and you can discuss any issue at length with him. He would either end up convincing you or you would have to convince him. He has gone through a lot of trauma in his formative years. His grandmother was killed by her security guards whom he used to play badminton with when he was 12, then his father whom he adored was killed. All this has made him very intense. But he has to lead. Almost everyone in the Congress is waiting for the leadership to draw a roadmap and to tell the cadre what to do. All are prepared to fight it out.

You cited the youth card with your leadership in these polls but the young demographic does not always want a young leader. India elected an 80-year-old PM in 2009 and then a 63-year-old in 2014.

You have to fire the imagination of the youth, as to what you can deliver. Mahatma Gandhi and Pandit Nehru weren’t young but they inspired the youth. Rahul Gandhi has it in him to inspire. And he is only 44. He has opportunity and age and time on his side. He should be hands-on. I don’t think he is now, not totally.

Hands-on means being seen more at the office or speaking everyday?

Whatever it means, and however he chooses to define it.

Were the results in the southern states as much of a shock as in the north ?

In Tamil Nadu, with the Dravidian parties at the helm, we have aligned with one of the two parties since 1977 to improve our numbers at the Centre. In Andhra Pradesh, we were let down by other parties. The decision to bifurcate the state, which was everyone’s decision, suddenly became the decision of the Congress. They ditched us, so we were wiped out. In Telangana, somehow, the TRS with two MPs could take the credit for the bifurcation, though with two MPs it just would not have been possible to push through the idea of bifurcation in the House. But they got away with it, thanks to us. But I was there in Vizag just after Hudhud had struck, with Rahul Gandhi. The people of this country have tremendous faith in the family. Six months ago, effigies of Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi were being burnt in AP. But I am a witness, Rahul Gandhi was mobbed on the streets there. People were kissing his hand and women were trying to shake his hand. Poeple in a Dalit basti told us how they were there because of Indira Gandhi and the YSR government and the Congress, as otherwise, the others would not have allowed them to settle there. The mass reception Rahul Gandhi got was not organised, as he just went out walking on the streets.