Kishor is Krishna or Kamsa for Congress
Preface: After reading the article under the head “Prashant Kishor moots Sonia Gandhi as Congress chief, new working president” in the Hindu Daily Newspaper of 21st April 2022, I wrote the article below.
Krishna or Kamsa Kishor wants Congress to draw inspirations, plans and executions on the five gestures of the dancing Shiva - Nataraja which represents five activities – viz. creation – drum, protection – abaya mudra, destruction – burning fire, embodiment – foot planted on the ground, release – foot held aloft.
Kishor wants to join Congress Party as a Main Party Man with position and power to chalk out strategies to be implemented unquestioned and answerable only to Sonia, Rahul and Priyanka – Triumvirate. This may happen though road ahead for Kishor and for other Congress Leaders going to be rough and tough terrains.
All his ideas had been consolidated in his well over 600 slides which are being scrutinized by a three-member committee comprising party veterans AK Antony, Ambika Soni and Mallikarjun Kharge.
Out of these 600 slides, some 88 slides were accessed by the press.
The accessed slides are said to suggest the following steps to revive Congress Party:
1. Congress should take five “strategic decisions”: fix the leadership issue; solve the alliance conundrum; reclaim the party’s founding tenets; create an army of grassroots leaders and foot-soldiers; and an ecosystem of supportive media and digital propagation.
2. Two Options to resolve the leadership issue:
1. Best High Impact Model: A non-Gandhi as Congress president, Sonia as UPA chairperson, Rahul as leader of the Parliamentary Board and Priyanka as general secretary coordination. This model, it says, will have a “high” impact. It says Rahul as head of the Parliamentary party can effectively represent the voice of the people both in Parliament and outside and pitch him against Modi.
2. Low Impact Model: Continuation of Sonia Gandhi as party
president, Rahul Gandhi as leader of the Parliamentary Board,
Priyanka Gandhi Vadra as general secretary coordination, a non
Gandhi as working or vice president and an “erstwhile” Congress
leader as UPA chairperson.
3. The strategist has suggested the Congress focus on contesting
358 Lok Sabha seats across 17 States alone, 168 seats across five
States with regional parties and 17 seats in the
NorthEast with smaller partners.
4. Stressing on the need to target 30 crore voters out of an
electorate size of 104 crore, Mr Kishor has proposed a
completely new architecture of election management, with an
election task force advising the Congress president. The poll
strategist has also suggested a completely new communication
architecture to create a “surround sound” of the party’s campaigns
across multiple platforms.
It seems that Congress is not ready to relinquish its power to non-
Gandhi member to become Congress President and hence much to
Kishor’s disappointment, Low Impact Model might have been settled
for the
present.
Some of Kishor’s observations are quite revealing and
realistic:
1. He says how the Congress has a “jaded and aged
leadership” and has not undertaken a structured pan-India membership drive in
the last 25 years. Only 23 out of the 118 of the central leadership are
elected; only two of the 66 CWC members are under 45.
2. And as high as 72 per cent of the existing AICC
delegates, district and block Presidents, are second or third-generation
Congress leaders.
3. He says, Congress has not conducted a nationwide
protest or agitation that has lasted for more than 24 hours since 2014. The
last mass public outreach campaign was the Bharat Yatra undertaken by Rajiv
Gandhi in 1990.
4. Going into the history of the
Congress’ collapse, he stated that four mass movements – the JP Movement,
Bofors, Mandal, Ram Mandir, and the rise of Modi and India Against Corruption –
harmed the party’s prospects and caused a decrease in vote share.
Kishor says that his plan to revive Congress was due
to the fact that Grand Old Party should not die and its revival is an important
factor for the democracy in India to grow in healthy and vibrant atmosphere and
also to check the unquestioned growth of BJP.
Politics cannot bring success by some marketing strategies and now in the information outreach, Kishor cannot just win with his strategies – fair or foul which he is capable of. But he is a force to reckon with and proper counter strategies by the BJP and other parties opposed to Congress become the need of the hour.
Kishor
want to reverse the trend of Congress Mukt which was the strategies of AAP in
Delhi and Punjab dethroning Congress Rule coupled with Didi’s defeating both
CPIM and Congress in West Bengal, Andhra Pradesh and Telegana Local Parties
against giving rooms for Congress to grow, Congress Revival with 23 Group
waging relentless but unsuccessful war so far against Gandhi Dynasty is going
to be a herculean task – Win or Waterloo moments await Kishor which is being
watched by all political minded people.
My fear is that Kishor’s ambitious plan for Congress to perform fivefold characteristics of Dance of Shiva may lead Congress to take the avatar of Padmasura and everyone knows what happened to Padmasura – Padmadura reduced to Ash due to Shiva taking Mohini avatar.
If Congress becomes Padmasura, then Kishor becomes
Kamsa under the guise of Krishna.
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