Even as the Congress is reeling under leadership crisis, lawmaker and party's charismatic leader Shashi Tharoor has felt that the vacuum at the top is likely to hurt Congress workers and sympathisers. “Time is a luxury that we in the Congress simply do not have,” he told Malayala Manorama in an exclusive interview recently.
He also said Congress should do away with the system of selecting the president. “The new president should be elected,” he said.
Edited excerpts of an interview
It has been more than two months since Rahul Gandhi said he is stepping down. Still his successor has not been named. What the reasons for this delay and what should be done next?
In all fairness, it must be said that to a certain extent the delay in finding a suitable successor for the post of Congress President is a reflection of both the immense place that Rahul Gandhi held in the hearts of the Congress sympathiser, the critical role and space he was operating in as well as a reflection of the serious challenges of the post itself—after all, given the current predicament of the party, finding a leader to helm the affairs of the party is not easy and must be a process that incorporates careful deliberation and consultation before a suitable successor to Rahul Gandhi is found.
Sadly, at the same time, with several state elections around the corner and situations like we have seen in Karnataka and Goa happening, time is a luxury that we in the Congress Party simply do not have. The fact also remains that the current leadership vacuum is likely to be hurting the Congress workers and sympathisers, many of whom miss the fact of having a party leader to look to for key decisions, authority and even inspiration and energy, to rally together and move forward. So I do hope that the CWC, recognising the seriousness of the situation, will not delay this decision any further and will work to find a suitable replacement, through a fresh electoral process for the post of Congress President.
The Congress Working Committee, which has the responsibility to select the new president, hasn't met after Rahul's resignation. Do you think the CWC has failed in its duty?
Again, I don’t think the situation is as black and white as has been speculated in some quarters. We must recognise that they are also dealing with a fairly complicated situation and it is natural to have some kind of an impasse following Rahul Gandhi’s momentous decision to resign. Having said that, as I mentioned before, it is in everybody’s interest that the current impasse is solved without any further delay.
If the CWC is to be dissolved, how can it select new members?
One way forward could be for the CWC to name an Interim President for the party and then ideally dissolve itself, following which the main leadership positions within the party, including the CWC itself, should be opened up to fresh elections. Allowing members of the party, drawn from the AICC and PCC delegates, to determine who will lead the party from these key positions, would help legitimise the new set of leaders and give them a credible mandate to lead the party. It could also have other beneficial effects — for instance, we have seen the global interest in the British Conservative Party during their recent leadership race, and replicating a similar scenario for the Congress will similarly increase the national interest in the party and galvanise more voters towards favouring the Congress party once again.
Senior leaders in the party who played a major role in election is still holding positions even after Rahul stepped down. Do you think senior leaders failed in their duty and by not owing the responsibility, failed the party itself?
I think we must all share equal accountability for the current situation the party finds itself and to have that restricted just to Rahul Gandhi or other senior leaders of the party is both unfair and an overly simplistic solution which we cannot afford right now. What we do need is to offer key leadership positions for fresh elections, which will simultaneously offer a credible mandate to incoming leaders while also in its own way offering a comprehensive accountability process for all members of the party, particularly those who subsequently take over key leadership positions.
It has been speculated that the new president will be nominated by the CWC based on consensus between the members. Does it mean that there is no democracy within the party?
I don’t think there is any point adding to the mountain of speculation that is being made every day with regard to the future of the Congress. For my part, I do believe that by institutionalising a process of fresh elections, where the workers of the party, drawn in from the rank and file of the party membership, get a say on the matter of who in the Congress should lead and represent them at the upper-echelons of the party, it will offer a credible mandate to the new set of leaders and help legitimise their positions and ultimately be a healthy process for the party to adopt as it weathers this current phase.
Rahul had said that no member from Gandhi - Nehru family should be his successor. But many leaders in the party secretly points out Priyanka is the best to lead at present. You have said it publicly. Does it mean that you are going against Rahul's wish?
Not at all. While I did say that I hoped that the party’s general secretary, Priyanka Gandhi, would throw her hat into the ring if a call for elections for the post of party president were made, I also highlighted that Rahul Gandhi’s statement that he doesn’t not want another member of the Gandhi family to replace him, does offer a challenge in this regard. Ultimately it is for the Gandhi family to collectively decide where they stand on this issue.
But if Priyanka Gandhi were to stand, I do think her natural charisma (which has prompted many to draw comparisons with her grandmother and former party president, the late Indira Gandhi) as well as her considerable administrative experience (having been an influential figure at the heart of the party and as a general secretary in eastern Uttar Pradesh) would certainly make her a highly competent candidate for this critical role. But I do respect the fact that ultimately this is both her personal decision as well as the collective one of her family at the end of the day.
Punjab Chief minister Amarinder Singh has batted for a young leader to be the new president of the party. You have also said a young leadership will be the better option. Do you think its time for Congress to go for a generational change?
While I do agree with his assessment and have voiced my own support for a younger leader, I don’t think this should in any way mean a blanket removal of all our senior and experienced leaders.
It is true that particularly given the current state of the party and the national picture, whoever assumes the mantle of president will undoubtedly need to achieve the twin goals of energising the party workers and inspiring the voters in favour of the Congress. If the new president is purely an organisational person, while he or she may be able to galvanise the workers and strengthen the foundations of the party, they may be unable to bring in the support of more voters. If the president is a charismatic figure but has poor organisational skills, while he or she may be personally appealing to the national electorate, they are unlikely to find a fully supportive party machinery to help translate their charisma and natural appeal into electoral results.
Under these circumstances, one would definitely like to believe that a younger leader, who has not been jaded by playing these roles for too long, would be in a better position to do both—that is to energise a party that certainly needs it and at the same time, appeal to more voters than we managed to during the last election. But the older generation of the Congress, all of whom are battle hardened warriors, have a significant role to play in the larger revival of the Congress, particularly given that many of them have the experience of having been in similar situations before. So what we would ideally like to see is a younger leader, backed by the wisdom, experience and support of the more experienced Congressmen and women in our ranks.
Whoever it is, the person should be elected rather than selected. That will give them strength in leading the party nationally.
BJP has set an age bar of 75 years for leaders to take up major party roles. Is it a good option for Congress to follow?
It's not an easy question to answer. In principle yes, all politicians should know when the time has come to gracefully step aside and make way for fresher blood. But my experience with arbitrary age cutoffs, as a senior manager at the UN, was that many people were unproductive well before they reached retirement age, whereas others were at their prime of performance when the calendar forced them to quit. The same is true in politics too. I would rather let the public decide who they want to represent them, which they can do by voting in a younger candidate -- at which point the superannuated politician will get the message. I would also take proactive steps to encourage younger people to get into politics, such as by lowering the age of candidates for elective office, or even reserving a certain number of seats in parliament for people under 30. When younger people get in they will inevitably crowd out the older ones. As with the law of the market, the logic of the electoral marketplace will settle the issue, without the artificial imposition of a retirement age.
But with regard to organisational duties, which is what your question refers to, the ideal combination has always been a careful amalgamation of seasoned and experienced hands, those who have seen the innumerous challenges that comes with the organisational needs of a large outfit as is the case with the Congress, along with young blood who can help implement organisational changes and have the capacity and energy to develop the Congress into a well-oiled political machine.
Kerala was the best performing state for Congress in the Lok Sabha election. But was Kerala leaders/MPs properly accommodated in major party positions in the Parliament?
The Indian National Congress is a national party and voices from all the states that the Congress has a presence in, even if recent election results their haven’t gone our way, are included in the highest decision making bodies of the party—after all, just because we may have suffered reverses in some states doesn’t mean that the party is going to shut shop there and can ignore the voices of leaders from those states. And this cuts both ways. Yes, we have done well in Kerala but that doesn’t automatically make the case for selection for major party positions including in Parliament. Our leaders like my good friend Kodikunnil Suresh, the Chief Whip, play a serious role every day in organising and leading the Congress on the floor of the Lok Sabha, which in itself offers a compelling example of seasoned MP’s from Kerala having received due recognition.
Sonia Gandhi has been active in the Lok Sabha leading now. Can she lead the party till a full time president is appointed?
I think her extensive prior experience in leading the party through critical times, as was the case following the tragic assassination of Rajiv Gandhi or at the height of the NDA 1 years, would definitely make her exactly the kind of an interim President that is needed to steady the ship till a full time president is appointed. But given that she relinquished the job less than two years ago, and her serious preoccupations as the chairperson of the Congress Parliamentary Party, including leading the party’s strategy in parliament, it may be difficult to persuade her to go “back to the future” and take on the responsibility of the post again.