Bypoll lessons for BJP and Congress: Shun ‘high command’ politics, groom strong state leaders

Prime Minister Narendra Modi and would-be Congress president Rahul Gandhi would do well to heed the message from the just concluded by-elections for three Lok Sabha and 29 Assembly seats across the country.

The results are a reminder that strong state leaders matter, whether they are bosses of their own regional parties or local satraps in a national party who have managed to hold their own despite the centralisation of power in a high command operating from Delhi.

From West Bengal to Assam, Madhya Pradesh to Rajasthan, Andhra Pradesh to Karnataka, voters made it clear that they want home-grown, active leaders with a ready connect to the state and its people. Whether it’s Mamata Banerjee, YS Jaganmohan Reddy, Himanta Biswa Sarma, Shivraj Singh Chauhan or Ashok Gehlot, all stand above and beyond the party to which they belong. Their success in the bypolls is a testimony to their popular appeal.

Modi and Rahul can ignore this only at their own peril as they gear up for crucial state elections in the run-up to the 2024 General Election. Many of these battles will be a direct face-off between the BJP and the Congress.

Perhaps the most interesting result came from Himachal Pradesh where the Congress swept the by-elections despite a BJP government in the state. Without denying the grand old party credit for its performance and smart choice of candidates, particularly late chief minister Virbhadra Singh’s widow Pratibha who cashed in on a sympathy wave for her husband in the battle for the Mandi Lok Sabha seat, the BJP has only itself to blame for its stunning losses.

Himachal has all the problems that other states face: COVID-19 , inflation, joblessness and other woes. Yet, in sharp contrast to Assam and Madhya Pradesh where the BJP is also in power and where it won handsomely in the bypolls despite similar troubles, the party suffered stunning reverses in the hill state.

The reversals came despite a yawning leadership vacuum in the Congress. Virbhadra Singh’s death has left a big hole that the party has not had the mind space to fix. So what happened?

The reason for the BJP’s surprisingly bad performance (it lost all three Assembly seats and the Lok Sabha seat) is rooted in its faceless, nameless leadership in Himachal. Chief Minister Jai Ram Thakur was handpicked by the RSS to head the government. But like most Sangh karyakartas, Thakur keeps a low profile and has made no effort to create space for himself in the minds and hearts of people. In fact, he is the polar opposite of his successful compatriots, Shivraj Singh Chauhan in MP and Himanta Biswa Sarma in Assam, both of who dominate the political landscape in their respective states at the risk of dwarfing their own party.

The loss in Mandi is particularly galling because the seat happens to be Jai Ram Thakur’s home ground. Clearly, the vote in Himachal is more a negative ruling against the BJP than a thumbs-up for a leaderless Congress.

The party paid a similar price in Karnataka where it recently replaced local strongman BS Yediyurappa with a relatively lightweight Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai. Yediyurappa had to go because he had fallen out of favour with Modi and Amit Shah. The result was that while it was able to retain one of the Assembly seats in the bypolls, the BJP lost the more important one of Hanagal which is the home turf of the new chief minister. Could the voters have delivered a stronger verdict than this on what they think of the ruling party’s uninspired choice of chief minister in place of the more charismatic Yediyurappa?

The signal from Rajasthan is no different. Here, the BJP is ridden with factionalism. Its high profile and possibly most popular local leader Vasundhara Raje is sulking because she is being undercut by rivals apparently at the behest of the “high command”. While the Congress too has its own share of internal problems with Sachin Pilot snapping at Ashok Gehlot’s heels, the chief miister managed to deliver in the bypolls by not only winning both Assembly seats but actually wresting a tribal seat away from the BJP.

The writing is on the wall for Modi and Rahul. The question is whether they will read it. The high command is a legacy from Indira Gandhi who cultivated the art of cutting down state leaders with popular appeal and a mass base that emboldened Independence.

The Congress has failed to shake off this legacy. The high command has gone from strength to strength and is flourishing under the Gandhi siblings as recent developments in poll bound Punjab have shown. Sitting chief minister Amarinder Singh was forced to step down because the high command was unable to turn him into a puppet. He has been replaced by a virtual nonentity, Charanjit Singh Channi, whose Dalit caste is being flaunted by the Congress in crude move to play identity politics.

The unexpected boon in Himachal Pradesh gives the Congress an opportunity to reclaim the state from the BJP, provided it reads the tea leaves and takes the necessary corrective steps to build a robust state leadership in time for the state polls in November 2022.

The same holds true for the BJP which under Modi and Shah has fallen into the same trap as the Congress by adopting its high command culture. Look at the way it replaced chief ministers in Gujarat, Uttarakhand and Karnataka. It would have been a wise move had it chosen strong local leaders with their ear to the ground. Unfortunately, in all three states, it opted for political lightweights who can be controlled from Delhi.

The only state where it has allowed a local strongman to remain is Uttar Pradesh after Yogi Adityanath fought a crafty battle against Delhi with the help of the RSS to keep his post. If at all the BJP has a fighting chance in the state, it’s because of Yogi and his Hindutva appeal.

The bypoll results could impact the shape of Indian politics in the months ahead should the two national leaders care to listen to the voices from the ground.

The writer is a veteran journalist and political commentator. Views expressed are personal.