Battered by successive electoral defeats at the hands of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) both at the national and regional levels, the Indian National Congress (INC) has finally realised that time has come to discard the Gandhian era of politics.
Ruled by Jawaharlal Nehru and his family since 1947, the party lost its lustre and popularity in the wake of a resurgent BJP that has been led by Narendra Modi in power since 2014.
With the next parliamentary elections due in 2024, Congress has decided to elect a new leader to replace Sonia Gandhi, the incumbent, thus signalling the end of dynastic politics within the party.
No longer a contender for the top job, her son Rahul Gandhi, a former party chief, is currently on a 3,500km march across the country to drum up support.
The two politicians so far in the fray are Shashi Tharoor and Ashok Gehlot. Tharoor is a former international civil servant, politician, writer and public intellectual from the southern province of Kerala, while his opponent Gehlot is the current chief minister of the western state of Rajasthan, bordering Pakistan, whose supporters say he has formidable organisational experience.
With party elections due soon, both face tough job in resurrecting the image and popularity of the secular INC, marred by desertions of seasoned leaders amidst internal wrangling.
Whoever is successful, the main task would be to reunite the party, map out a political strategy and programme to bring back disgruntled supporters and live up to the challenge posed by the right-wing BJP.
FAWAD HASHMEY
LAHORE
