Analysis | Can Priyanka's charm harm saffron show in UP

Make no mistake, Priyanka Gandhi has an infectious charm seeped in the reclusive legacy of the Gandhi family.

With this aura, Priyanka is stepping into the minefield of active politics, thrust upon her by her brother and Congress president Rahul Gandhi.

Like Priyanka and Rahul himself, their parents Rajiv and Sonia Gandhi too were reluctant entrants to the political turf. Unlike, Indira and Sanjay Gandhi.

No doubt, Priyanka's dramatic political entry will galvanise the Congress cadre, or whatever remains of it, across the country.

That has to be channelised to curate the minds of a majority of the nearly 90 crore voters for Priyanka to steer Congress to a pole position in national politics, from the brink of extinction the Grand Old Party was staring at.

After a string of electoral debacles, the Congress has hit the revival mode by wresting power in three states – Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh – late in 2018.

Now, the Congress sees Priyanka as a trump card which can drastically re-jig its fortunes and the political destiny of the country.

While Priyanka's charm is an electrifying factor, she lacks the invincibility tag of her grandmother, which probably prompted Dev Kant Barooah, who was the Congress president during the time of Emergency, to proclaim that India is Indira.

Remnants of such a sycophantic approach is still running through the DNA of the Indian National Congress. Therein lies Priyanka's strength and ironically challenge too.

Congressmen will obediently fall in line with the Gandhi tag she espouses. That will act as a magic wand in political landscapes where the Congress still has a connect.

But Priyanka still is an untested commodity in electoral politics baring a few poll campaigns in Gandhi family strongholds of Amethi and Raebareli.

Window of opportunity

Her biggest challenge will be the battle ground state of Uttar Pradesh, which picks 80 lawmakers to the Lok Sabha, the lower house of Parliament.

She has been anointed AICC general secretary in-charge of Eastern UP, which roughly accounts for half of UP's Lok Sabha seats including Varanasi, Prime Minister Narendra Modi's constituency, and Gorakhpur, where UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath was a five-time MP.

The Congress aims to contest all 80 seats in Uttar Pradesh and hopes to win 30 of it. Realistically, the Congress will be fortunate enough to make an impact in 15 of the 21 seats it won in 2009 in eastern UP. This incudes Amethi and Raebareli.

Uttar Pradesh is a stiff challenge for Congress. The BSP-SP combine has kept it out of the Mahagatbandhan or Grand Alliance.

The BJP has come out with a 10 per cent quota for economically backward poor. The Congress can at best hope to split the upper caste votes in UP with the BJP, which could work to the advantage of the SP-BSP combine.

Remember, despite keeping the Congress out of a coalition, the combine has announced it won't put up candidates in Amethi and Raebareli.

This is a window of opportunity to strike post-poll alliances.

For the rest of the country, Priyanka's aura and Gandhi lineage could still work with the assistance of Congress governments in power in Hindi belt states of Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh.

In Bihar, the party will again have to strike a seat-sharing deal with Lalu's RJD, which is now helmed by his son Tejaswi. BJP ally JD(U)'s Prashant Kishore has welcomed her entry and this will give the Congress some leeway in seat-sharing talks with RJD.

In Maharashtra, the Congress and the NCP alliance seems to have stitched a seat-sharing deal and Priyanka's dramatic political foray will be a bonus. Sharad Pawar's daughter Supriya Sule has sort of welcomed Priyanka's entry.

Dynasty rhetoric

The BJP has echoed the dynasty politics theme while adopting a cautious approach to Priyanka's political foray. It cannot escalate the dynasty rhetoric, lest that would boomerang on many of its own leaders as well as allies.

Leaders across the political spectrum have not hesitated to handhold their kith and kin to their respective political turfs.

Only that the Congress could go a step further and enact this at the Centre itself, for only it has won a mandate to rule over this nation for so long.

In other words, no other party got such an opportunity to build a dynasty at the Centre. The BJP is yet to carefully weigh the impact of Priyanka's dramatic political foray.

So far it has desisted from attacking Priyanka Gandhi, but her businessman husband Robert Vadra, who is facing a slew of charges, is sure to draw flak from the saffron party.

In the southern horizon, Priyanka will be able to lead a charm offensive in Karnataka and Kerala, states where the Congress organisational machinery is still functional.

In Tamil Nadu, it can piggyback on the DMK's shoulders to better its prospects. The DMK and the JD(S), Congress' allies in TN and Karnataka, are not averse to having Rahul as a PM candidate in case of a near certain fractured verdict.

The Priyanka card played by the Congress is a virtual wakeup call for Congress activists and a puzzle for the BJP-led NDA.

Rahul Gandhi can hope to delegate some of his authority to his sister while he criss-crosses the country in the run-up to polls.

Now the electorate will decide whether to bestow a larger-than-life aura to Priyanka Gandhi, who is crossing over to a politically charged terrain.

As of now, the mother of two has just made a mass entry.

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