Jignesh
Mevani and Kanhaiya Kumar after expressing support for and joining
Congress respectively in New Delhi, Tuesday, September 28, 2021. Photo:
PTI
New Delhi:
Jignesh Mevani and Kanhaiya Kumar, both of whom shot into the limelight
with their fierce and unrelenting opposition to the Narendra Modi
government over the past few years, joined the Congress party on
Tuesday.
Mevani, currently an independent MLA
from Gujarat’s Vadgam, had earlier announced that both he and Kanhaiya
Kumar would join the Congress. On his part, Kumar, earlier a national
executive council member of the Communist Party of India (CPI), had
remained tight-lipped, even as his party comrades rebuffed the
speculation over his imminent departure.
On Tuesday afternoon, all doubts
cleared. Kanhaiya was officially inducted into the Congress by former
party president Rahul Gandhi. Mevani only announced his “affiliation”
with Congress, as formally joining would have meant that he would have
had to resign from his MLA’s position to which he was elected as an
independent candidate.
As Congress secures two high-profile
leaders, it becomes clear that Mevani and Kumar are to be among the top
faces for the party in the 2024 parliamentary polls. Informed sources in
the Congress told The Wire that Rahul
Gandhi, who still holds the reins to party functioning, was
particularly keen on them joining Congress as part of his plan to pass
the mantle to fresh and bold voices.
Beating
the stereotypical pattern of formal induction events, Mevani and Kumar
turned the occasion into a stage for launching a scathing criticism of
the Sangh parivar while announcing their political plans for the future.
Both said that they have joined the Congress with “a sense of urgency
to save the idea of India” and “protect the constitution”, which they
said were under an unprecedented attack by the BJP-led regime.
“I am joining the Congress because
it’s not just a party, it’s an idea. It’s the country’s oldest and most
democratic party, and I am emphasising ‘democratic’…Not just me, but
many think the country can’t survive without Congress,” Kumar said at
the press briefing, adding that the Congress is like a “big ship”.
“If it’s saved, I believe many
people’s aspirations, Mahatma Gandhi’s oneness, Bhagat Singh’s courage,
and B.R. Ambedkar’s idea of equality will be protected, too. This is why
I have joined it,” he said.
Similarly, Mevani said, “To
save democracy and the idea of India, I have to be with a party that
led the Independence struggle and dragged the British out of the
country. This is why I am here with the Congress today.”
Rajya
Sabha MP KC Venugopal felicitates newly joined Congress member Kanhaiya
Kumar, at AICC in New Delhi, Tuesday, Sep. 28, 2021. MLA Jignesh Mewani
is also seen. Photo: PTI
Kumar said that while he has learnt
everything from his parent party, the CPI, and owed a lot to it, he
believed that the Congress, which is in direct competition with the BJP
in more than 200 out of 545 parliamentary seats, is better placed to
“save India” from the Sangh Parivar, which, according to him, is on a
mission to fundamentally transform the country’s ideological and
constitutional tenets for the worse.
On why he chose the Congress over the
CPI, he said that the current political struggle against the BJP could
only be fought and led by overcoming “ideological narrowness” and that
any political force should sense an urgency to immediately accelerate
its course of action.
Kumar and Mevani switching over to the Congress assumes significance for other reasons too.
First, in the past, the communists have seen young, dynamic leaders
choosing the Congress or other parties and forums in the long run. Some
of the most prominent names among such leaders include the Nationalist
Congress Party’s D.P. Tripathi, Congress leader from Rajasthan Batti Lal
Bairwa, Congress’s Rajya Sabha MP from Karnataka Syed Naseer Hussain,
Congress national secretary Shakeel Ahmed Khan, Prasenjit Bose who has
founded his own forum in Kolkata, and more recently former JNUSU
presidents Sandeep Singh and Mohit Pandey.
Kumar’s defection to the Congress suggests that the trend started by
the prominent communist leader and former Lok Sabha MP Mohan
Kumaramangalam, who switched over from the CPI to the Congress in 1967,
has not ended.
Many who quit the Left parties could
not adjust to their rigid structures, which are largely governed by the
principle of “democratic centralism”. The centralised structure worked
in the party’s favour at a time when communist parties also led multiple
movements concerning socio-economic issues of the working classes.
However, with the presence of these
parties diminishing in most parts of India over time, young activists
saw the party’s rigidity as an impediment. Many who switched over to
other parties after learning the ropes of politics as Leftists said the
slow-decision making in their parent parties was stifling the energy of
youth activists.
Kumar came to national prominence after a rousing speech in 2016
as the Jawaharlal Nehru University Students’ Union president. In what
was a highly tense environment after he, along with two other JNU
students Umar Khalid and Anirban Bhattacharya, were arrested in a
sedition case, Kumar spoke after he was released on bail. His
televised speech touched upon multiple concerns that resonated with a
large section of Indian youth and was considered by many as one of the
most articulate criticisms of the BJP.
Kanhaiya Kumar, Umar Khalid and Anirban Bhattacharya in JNU. Photo: PTI/Files
He went on to campaign against the
BJP in many states and platforms, contested the 2019 Lok Sabha elections
in Bihar on a CPI ticket, and gradually emerged as one of the most
prominent independent critics of the Modi government and the Sangh
Parivar.
Also read: The BJP Has Its Own Toolkit to Go After Dissidents Which It Uses Ruthlessly
Unlike Kumar, Mevani did not belong
to a Left party but doesn’t hesitate to admit his Marxist beliefs.
Having worked with eminent human rights lawyer Mukul Sinha in Ahmedabad,
Mevani, also a lawyer, took up cases of the most marginalised in
Gujarat, and gradually emerged as a notable Dalit activist. In many of
his speeches, he takes up the socio-economic concerns of Dalits and
minorities – issues which Left parties have historically raised – the
most prominent among them being land reforms and labour rights.
He shot to prominence in July 2016
when he led a mass demonstration against the brutal beating of Dalit
youths by ‘cow protection’ vigilantes in the presence of police. He
had first joined the Aam Aadmi Party in 2014 but plunged into electoral
politics when in 2017 he contested the Gujarat assembly polls from
Vadgam as an independent candidate.
Mevani,
along with Patidar leader Hardik Patel and Alpesh Thakore, who has now
joined the BJP, became the faces of opposition in the run up to that
election. Sensing his popularity, Rahul Gandhi decided to extend his
party’s support to Mevani and helped him win.
While the Left could not retain two
of its most popular leaders, the Congress has shown unusual alacrity in
joining forces with them. Over the last few years, Rahul Gandhi has
placed multiple student leaders from diverse Leftist backgrounds in
important positions. His own interventions over the last few years have
been pointedly welfarist in nature. Even as many Congress leaders have
resorted to what is now known as “soft Hindutva”, Gandhi has
unhesitatingly advanced an ideological criticism of the Sangh parivar at
every juncture, even while proclaiming his own Hinduness on several
occasions.
Not only has he been the most
unapologetic critic of the Modi government for its majoritarian
politics, he has also taken up economic concerns of the poor. At the
same time, he has pointedly attacked Modi government’s alleged cronyism
which, according to the former Congress president, has favoured select
corporate entities.
In the past few days, Gandhi, who has also battled the charge of indecision, has taken bold decisions like appointing the first ever Dalit chief minister of Punjab, or supporting OBC chief minister Bhupesh Baghel over his rival T.S. Singh Deo
in Chhattisgarh. The Congress in opposition has historically taken
left-of-centre positions but many in the party believe that the party’s
recent leftward turn is much more decisive and is being taken to mould
the party fundamentally under the leadership of Gandhi.
While a section in the party is
somewhat discomfited by this, Gandhi’s interventions appear to be
attracting many like Kumar and Mevani to the Congress.
SOURCE ; THE WIRE
Social media is bold.
Social media is young.
Social media raises questions.
Social media is not satisfied with an answer.
Social media looks at the big picture.
Social media is interested in every detail.
social media is curious.
Social media is free.
Social media is irreplaceable.
But never irrelevant.
Social media is you.
(With input from news agency language)
If you like this story, share it with a friend!
We are a non-profit organization. Help us financially to keep our journalism free from government and corporate pressure
0 Comments