CONGRESS IN A TIGHT SPOT

The “India Shining” campaign kicked off by the NDA in 2004 with a bang ended in a whimper. Similarly, now in 2009, the “Jai Ho” campaign of the grand old party of the country that began with some confidence seems to be all set to meet the same fate of the “India Shining” campaign as the third phase of the elections is over. There were no substantial issues that the party could raise during the run up to the polls for a healthy discussion or debate except to react to its opponents charges or to hurl the same epithets or abuses that were thrown at it. There was neither imagination nor newness even in returning the abuses. For example, when the BJP called Dr Manmohan Singh as “night watchman” to keep the seat warm for the dynastic heir Rahul Singh, NDA’s PM candidate LK Advani was dubbed as “night watchman” for keeping the chair warm for Narendra Modi. Even school boys would come out with better and imaginative phrases, I mean abuses.

On every issue that was raised by the Opposition during the campaign the Congress either fumbled or was found to be utterly defenceless. Take the issue of Otavio Quattarocchi. Well, the ghost has resurfaced at the wrong time for the party. But how did the party react? The party wants the people of this country to believe that there was no scandal involving the Bofors gun deal. “Where is the evidence”? “No shred of evidence to link up the top echelons of the party” “All the courts have thrown out the case”. “CBI acts on its own” “Don’t flog a dead horse”. These are the one-liners coming from the party spokespersons right from the Law Minister. Probably the party thinks that the first time voters may not even know the nuances of Bofors scam nor the slogan in those days “Galli Galli mein Shor hai, Rajiv Gandhi Chor hai” and that the man who got the record-breaking mandate in 1984 was made to bite the dust by the people of this country precisely because of the scam.

The party which used the CBI to scuttle the probe at every stage and helped the most intimate friend of 10 Janpath -“Q” - (a code in the Bofors diary) to flee the country now says that when there was no case against him, why should his name be in the Interpol’s Red Corner notice list. If he is such an innocent and noble soul and there is no evidence against him, why should he hide himself in Malaysia and try to get out of Argentina when arrested? He could have as well faced the law courts here and got himself acquitted of all the charges. It could have greatly relieved his friends at 10 Janpath of acute embarrassment. That much he should have done for his friends. On the contrary, four days before the country could get documents from Sweden linking him to the gun deal, he fled the country. Could he account for the 7.2 million dollars in his account that was frozen for long and was defrozen because of the Congress government’s chicanery? At every stage the Congress government used the CBI to dilute the case against “Q” and now asks the NDA government what did it do during its tenure. True, as some analysts point out that the “Q” episode, timing of which is undoubtedly suspicious, may not decisively work against the Congress poll prospects. But it has greatly dented its credibility and political morality with the result that every cartoonist replaces the first letter of Congress with “Q” to read “Qongress”. What a shame!

Even on the issue of black money that is stashed away in tax havens, the Congress was found talking in too many voices. First, it said that the Leader of the Opposition was relying on some bogus data available on the internet. Then a question was asked what did the NDA government do during its tenure to bring back the money to India. When Prime Minister was asked to raise the issue at G-20, we were told that G-20 was not the forum to discuss such issues when in fact it was in the G-20 agenda. When all these alibis did not convince the people, it was revealed that the government did get names from the German government. Of course, we are yet to know those names. If this is true, where was the need to come out with those excuses in the first place. What the people of this country were not told was that global pressure was increasing on the tax havens to cough up the illegal money because of the unprecedented cash crunch. Every developed country is facing liquidity crunch and they want to arm twist the tax havens and it is in this connection Opposition wanted India too to join the campaign so that the black money of 75 lakh crores, atleast a part of it, can be brought back. Again, the Congress failed in “MQ” test (Morality quotient)

The most sordid drama that was played during the poll campaign with absolute insensitivity and inhuman intent was that of UPA partner – DMK. What was uppermost in the mind of its chief Karunanidhi was the vote box rather than the tinderbox that innocent Sri Lankan Tamils were exposed to trapped as they are in the war between LTTE and Sri Lankan Army. The Congress played its own role in this drama. Karunanidhi is a very good script writer no doubt, but his skills did not stand by him while writing the script for his five-hour fast-unto-death drama. He knew, thanks to his Qongress friends in Delhi, that Sri Lanka might announce that it would not use heavy guns in the war zone to avoid collateral damage and Karunanidhi sprang a surprise by spreading his bed in the Marina beach one fine morning after his breakfast. When the Sri Lankan statement came within hours, he broke his fast and claimed victory. After he broke the so-called fast, Sri Lanka said there was no ceasefire. As someone said it was a “fast between breakfast and lunch”. The “fast” – a weapon used by Mahatma Gandhi – lost its credibility long ago when every politician used it to blackmail his opponents. Now, Karunanidhi made the very expression a joke and poor Mahathma must be turning in his grave. Congress, being a staunch supporter of DMK chief, must share his sins as well and it will definitely have its impact on the poll prospects of both the parties in Tamil Nadu. After all, you can’t fool the people all the time.
In all probability “Jai Ho” may be for Indian democracy, but difficult to say whether it will be for the Congress. It is quite a funny situation that its leader who is spearheading the poll campaign with her family is not the contender for power and nominates a person who is not even contesting the elections leave alone leading the campaign.