Commentary/T V R Shenoy

The Punjab rout means Kesri can now stop dreaming of becoming prime minister

In this competitive age, schoolchildren are taught that anything less than 100 out of 100 is unacceptable. But did you know that even 14 out of 117 is something to smile about? That, in a nutshell, is the result of the Punjab assembly poll.

But first, a word for the winners -- the people of Punjab. They are finally free of long spells of President's Rule and Congress misrule. (One can only hope the voters of Uttar Pradesh too have their rights restored.)

That said, it isn't just the Akali-Dal-BJP alliance that should be cheering. It is also the United Front (Janata Dal, CPI-M, Samajwadi Party). The guardians of 'secularism' haven't won a single seat. But that doesn't worry them.

Why? Because the people of Punjab have reminded the Congress just how low the party stands in the public eye. Which means Congressmen can't afford to shake the boat just now.

Up to now, it was possible for the Congress to blame its fall in North India on Narasimha Rao. And that was precisely the course followed by the party. After all, anti-Rao rhetoric worked for the non-Congress parties, didn't it!

Sitaram Kesri, who played his Gandhi cap at Rao's feet when made president, bulldozed the fallen leader. And new depths were reached when S B Chavan, home minister throughout the Rao years, accused him of every sin in the book.

But whom does the Congress propose to blame for the debacle in Punjab? Sitaram Kesri replaced H S Brar, a Rao loyalist, with his own choice as chief minister. He replaced Ambika Soni, the party observer for Punjab, with Ghulam Nabi Azad.

All this was done in the name of revitalising the party. It hasn't worked. Because Kesri was trying to cure cancer with plastic surgery.

The Congress party is rotten to the core. The Beant Singh, Brar, and Bhattal ministries were seem as monuments to corruption and nepotism. Those criticisms can be applied to the Congress in every other state too.

So shuffling faces at the top won't solve anything. Because the voters know perfectly well that the new people are no better than the old lot. (Frankly, I simply can't understand the logic behind appointing someone like Ghulam Nabi Azad -- a Kashmiri who ran away to Maharashtra talking rubbish about standing up to terrorism!)

When I speak of new faces at the helm of the Congress, I am not limiting myself to a Bhattal or an Azad. That is equally true of Sitaram Kesri.

Punjab was the testing ground of the post-Rao Congress. It was where Kesri would prove that he could win an election. He has failed utterly.

He can now stop dreaming of becoming prime minister. Instead, he can start worrying about retaining his seat as Congress president.

The reason why the Congress united against Rao was because he was seen as an obstacle to power. No party would join hands with the Congress as long as Rao was the leader.

Once Narasimha Rao was out of power, Kesri felt free to bulldoze H D Deve Gowda. He fed his party dreams of assuming power with the help of Mulayam Singh Yadav and Laloo Prasad Yadav.

But Punjab has proved that there is no point in any party allying with the Congress. It has also shown Congress MPs their future if they press Deve Gowda to dissolving the Lok Sabha -- sitting in opposition to a BJP-led ministry.

The BJP has become stronger in the past eight months. (A recent opinion poll says the party and its allies could win as many as 240 Lok Sabha seats if elections were held today.)

If the Congress really wants a share of power, it must do so by joining the United Front. But can a Congress president serve under a prime minister from another party?

Sitaram Kesri would lose every speck of authority by doing so. Sharad Pawar, on the other hand, can do so easily enough. And the canny Maratha leader has been preaching the virtues of co-operation.

That too would destroy Kesri. Ever since the famous clash between Purushottam Das Tandon and Jawaharlal Nehru 45 years ago, Congressmen have preferred the man in office to the man at the head of the party. As deputy prime minister Pawar would be a far greater threat to Kesri than Deve Gowda can ever be.

It is in Kesri's best interests, therefore, to retain the status quo -- Deve Gowda as prime minister with Congress 'support from outside'. But why should other Congressmen go along?

As noted above, the Congress ousted Rao because he kept them out of power. Do they have any reason to treat Kesri with any greater kindness?

We should know the answer in three months. The Congress organisational elections are due to be held in May. Sitaram Kesri could win just over one-tenth of Punjab's 117 seats. How many votes will he win from the 8,000-odd Congress delegates?

Tell us what you think of this column