If there were a contest for scoring political self-goals, the Congress would almost certainly strike gold. The Karnataka ‘nataka’ or ‘Game of Thrones’ has kept the news wheel churning for weeks. Kaun Banega Mukhya Mantri, DK Shivakumar (DKS) or Siddaramaiah (Sidda), is only the latest Congress political soap opera being played out in full media glare: even the breakfast menu at the meetings between the two leaders has been dissected in some detail. Ambitious regional satraps and a weakened high command are a potent mix for creating a rather messed-up, spicy Kannadiga thali. So who is responsible for the growing perception of drift and chaos in the Congress’s one last remaining large state fortress?
Let’s start with the highly skilled Bengaluru power players first. DKS and Sidda are like chalk and cheese. The former is a quintessential party strongman, resourceful and rumbustious in equal measure. DKS’s swagger has a Big Boss look to it, an astute deal-maker who doesn’t hide his vaulting ambition in any false piety. Sidda, on the other hand, is the old-style neta, much more cautious in his moves but very crafty at the same time. Where DKS won’t hold back from speaking his mind, Sidda chooses to couch his monosyllabic interventions in ambiguity, carefully designed to keep his opponents guessing all the time.
In an ideal world, Congress would have found space to accommodate both leaders relatively amicably. But these are far from good times for a moth-eaten Grand Old Party, its once insatiable appetite for power and conflict resolution now sapped by years of iner tia and ineptitude. Take, for example, the idea of a two-and-a-half-year rotational chief ministership. It is, frankly, a bizarre concept, one that is mostly unworkable in the Indian context. No one leaves any ‘kursi’ voluntarily in this country. The rotational chief ministership idea collapsed in Rajasthan in acrimony and rebellion; it was sabotaged at the last stretch in Chhattisgarh. Why would it work in Karnataka?
The problem is that the so-called Congress ‘high command’ is unwilling or unable to take tough decisions that are required in tough times. The Congress ‘revival’, or more likely survival, in the 2024 general elections had earned Rahul Gandhi the goodwill and, more crucially, the respect of his own party cadres. A copy of the Constitution in hand, he had led from the front to challenge the BJP juggernaut. His opponents may have mocked him, but within the Congress, Rahul’s unwavering resolve to take on the Sangh Parivar firmly established him as the party’s unquestioned leader. But instead of enforcing his writ within the party organisation as a hands-on politician, Rahul chose to outsource not ty organisational issues to his loyalists, more specifically to KC Venugopal, now the second most powerful person within the Congress ‘system’.
As a result, the gains of 2024 were quickly squandered. Haryana’s debacle was the result of sheer overconfidence, Maharashtra was effectively ‘bought’ by the BJP with cash transfers to women playing a major role in the last-minute heist, while the Congress campaigns in Delhi and Bihar were always non-starters. With every defeat, the Congress ‘high command’ appears even more reluctant to make hard political choices, living by the old Nara Simha Rao dictum that ‘sometimes in politics, not taking a decision is the best decision’!
But who really is the high command, because it now seems a rather archaic term to use for an entity that is neither ‘high’ nor in ‘command’ any longer. The ‘high command’ isn’t Sonia Gandhi any longer since she is in semi-retirement; it isn’t Malikarjun Kharge since he isn’t the kind who will rock the boat; it surely isn’t Priyanka Gandhi Vadra since she hasn’t been given any specific responsibility within the party. This leaves Rahul Gandhi as the one Congress leader who has the authority to take crucial decisions. But all indications suggest that Rahul’s self-image is that of an ideological warrior and not an organisation nuts-and-bolts man that the Congress so desperately needs.
Which brings one back to the Congress’s Karnataka conundrum. To be fair, there are no easy options here. Sid still enjoys the support of a majority of MLAs, and his OBC credentials make him an invaluable asset to Congress’s professed commitment to being a party that seeks to empower the backwards. DKS is 63, 14 years younger and far more energetic than his rival, who will, early next year be become Karnataka’s longest serving CM. A transition from Sid da to DKS would mean a generational change of sorts in a party that has been notoriously reluctant to send its veteran leaders into a ‘Marg-Darshak Mandal’. Previously, in MP and Rajasthan, the Congress baulked at the idea of a generational change and lost out. Karnataka presents another opportunity, although Sidda is no pushover, who will retreat into the shadows quietly.
Even if there is a sem blance of a smooth handover sometime in 202,7, as is now widely speculated, how long will the truce last? The BJP can get away with forcing the resignations of all its Gujarat ministers overnight without a murmur of dissent. This is because the real ‘high command’ in Indian politics is at 7 Lok Kalyan Marg and 6 A Krishna Menon Marg, where all major decisions affecting the BJP are taken. The Congress doesn’t have anything remotely like Gujarat’s Jodi number one, who can have their way on almost every issue. There are intense power tussles in several BJP states too, most notably Goa, but no leader dares say a word publicly because of the fear factor that prevails in the party. In Congress, on the other hand, this is open season for all stakeholders to slug it out without any fear of retaliation. When the high command goes missing or is enfeebled, the rules in the political jungle change. As Karnataka has shown, it’s now a case of ‘each man for himself’ where only the fittest will survive.
Post-script: For history buffs, it might be useful to remember that the Congress decline in Karnataka began in the early 1980s when its original mass leader, Devaraj Urs, was peremptorily ousted by an imperious Sanjay Gandhi. Unlike his uncle, Rahul Gandhi clearly doesn’t believe in ‘off with his head’ ruthless power politics. It may be both his strength and possibly his weakness, too.
The writer is a senior journalist and author.
