#Epic fail: Shaky Congress’ laments over Modi

When Narendra Modi was anointed Bhartiya Janata party’s prime ministerial candidate yesterday, Congress was only interested in the feud inside it. Just a few days from “Why Bhartiya Janata Party is not revealing its prime minister candidate?” Congress took a 180 degree flip to “How does it matter? It is an internal matter of a party”.

All the while they were ridiculing the “hype’ surrounding the anointment of Modi. The same union minister Kapil Sibal who had taunted BJP for being leaderless now calls it an “early Diwali celebration”. Talking to media, information and broadcasting minister said, “A Nagpur-based shadowy cabal of unaccountable geriatric gentlemen in period attire can ram decisions down BJP’s throat and call it internal democracy.”

They also called Modi’s leadership a “clear sign of RSS takeover of BJP’s affairs and it moving to extreme Hindutva agenda”.

Shying away from their future remarks about their heir apparent, reportedly they chose to talk about rising industrial production and “turn around” of economy, arguing that good things are happening despite all kinds of talks by the “prophets of doom”.

Why this change in Congress attitude? Are they under the fear that projecting Rahul Gandhi as their PM candidate now will fuel the debate of Rahul vs Modi more and people will pay less attention to their policies devised for vote gains? But one thing is for sure that the Congress party is now paying more attention to the blots in Modi’s career for that will divert public’s attention from their own dark patches. In fact Congress party members have started calling Modi their “real poll plank” for this.

Now the poll will not be about corruption or price rise. It won’t be over fuel prices too. It will only be about Modi vs Rahul or whoever Congress high command chooses to be their PM candidate.

To some extent, BJP is to blame for the situation because Modi’s figure is larger than life. The whole country has been, to some extent, in an awe of him. Rahul Gandhi has not been able to show that charisma so far. He is not even seen as a match to Modi.

And for that part, Congress’s own prince is to be blamed. He has never been keen on leading the nation. He has always demanded time saying he is not ready and that he is “ready to curb their own dreams for making people’s dream come true”. For the rest of the time, he is either discovering India or is out of the scene.

Till few days ago, the Congress party has been showering praises over Rahul. Everybody in the party, from low cadre to high leaders, has been calling him their future prime ministerial candidate. Now they are shying away from this saying that they will declare their leader “on time”. Rather than repeating the same lines they have chosen to rant about the seeming “undemocratic” process by which Modi was anointed. Perhaps they were thinking that Advani will be able to stall the process.

But now that Modi has arrived on the scene officially, they have their own reasons to be worried. They have tried in vain to dismiss the Rahul vs Modi debate by saying that BJP is trying to make the whole scenario like America’s presidential election.

Whatever they say, we know the Congress is now shaking to its core just like their laments.