Twenty press conference across the country on Sunday and a nation-wide satyagraha on Monday by members of Parliament and State lawmakers against the Agnipath recruitment scheme, the Congress plans to step up its campaign against the new recruitment scheme for the defence services.
While the move is aimed at reaching out to the youth who are protesting against the new scheme, it is also a way to reconnect with the people through the path of agitations.
The party has already announced a Kanyakumari to Kashmir Bharat Jodo [Unite India] yatra to coincide with Mahatma Gandhi’s birth anniversary on October 2; took out Azadi Gaurav yatra and organised other protests against price rise and unemployment following the call given at the Nav Sankalp chintan shivir in Udaipur last month.
And when former Congress chief Rahul Gandhi was subjected to long hours of questioning by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) in a money laundering case involving the National Herald newspaper , the party converted the occasion into a massive show of strength on the streets of Delhi.
Starting June 13, the first day of Mr. Gandhi’s questioning, party leaders and workers were in protest mode for over a week to highlight the misuse of ED against their leader. With many MPs and top party leaders including Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot and his Chhattisgarh counterpart, Bhupesh Baghel, taking part in the protests for several days, many were prompted to ask if the Congress takes up a common man’s issues with the same vigour.
Senior party leader and a member of the Congress Working Committee (CWC), Abhishek Manu Singhvi, said the party cannot be “accused of being supine or inactive in the same breath when protests over various issues are taking place”.
“I must point out that there have been a series of such movements since 2014 and it is only for COVID that there were a few pauses,” Mr. Singhvi told The Hindu.
Professor Ashutosh Kumar, who teaches Political Science in Panjab University, said though inflation, unemployment are intensely political issues, the Congress has not been able convert them into an effective political narrative.
“Somehow the Congress has been unable to bring these issues to the fore and build a strong narrative. And I must say that the media too hasn’t been very helpful in this regard,” Mr. Kumar said.
Reflecting on Mr. Gandhi’s recent statement that he wants to transform the Congress into a party of protests, he said the Congress and Rahul Gandhi are trying to go back to its past legacy of padayatras and satyagrahas.
“The concept of yatra evokes a saintly idiom in politics; an image that you are fighting for a cause by leaving the comforts of your home. Whether or not it will work for the Congress, one can say only after they have undertaken it. But the issue is also about leadership and the Congress doesn’t have anyone with [Trinamool chief] Mamata Banerjee’s image of being a street fighter,” he said.
