Fresh from Rajasthan bypoll win, PCC chief Sachin Pilot explains the ?surgical management? that led to the victory, why those three seats matter nationally, and what the Congress did wrong in the LS polls. This Idea Exchange was moderated by Manoj CG of The Indian Express
Manoj CG: The trend in the recent by-elections has been the ruling party winning seats, be it in Uttar Pradesh, Karnataka or Uttarakhand. But that wasn?t the case in Rajasthan where the Congress won three of the four seats that went to polls.
What happened in Rajasthan is significant because all the four seats that went to polls were held by the BJP and they had won all by huge margins. So not many were betting on the Congress in the by-elections. Our campaigning, selection of
candidates, strategising, management of poll booths at the panchayat level, decentralisation of workers, all came together and we were able to pull off this victory. The chief minister had a lot of stake in it and she put in a lot of effort and resources. (But we won) perhaps because in its nine months, the
Rajasthan government has
not been able to live up to people?s expectations.
Coomi Kapoor: But in the Lok Sabha elections, you had got totally wiped out.
The (Rajasthan) Assembly elections had seen the Congress being reduced to a historic low?21 seats, or 10% of 200. I think because the Lok Sabha elections were held so soon after that, we weren?t able to come out of the shadow of this massive loss. Not to say that we did better in any other state?in seven states, we didn?t even open our account. But after such a massive loss, in 100 days, we?ve been able to turn things around quite dramatically.
Unni Rajen Shanker: Would you say that the Lok Sabha elections were about Narendra Modi and the by-elections were not?
I can?t make it so convenient for the BJP ? when it suits them, it?s about Mr Modi, and when it doesn?t, it?s not about Mr Modi. When they win the Delhi University elections, it?s all about Mr Modi, but when they lose Rajasthan or Gujarat bypolls, it?s a local issue… So I leave it to the BJP to answer whether it?s a failure of the Rajasthan government or the vanishing of the Modi wave. I would like to focus on the fact that we won this election fair and square, despite all the money and resources (put in by the BJP)? bureaucracy, police, administration, politicians, MPs, MLAs, ministers camping day in and day out, village to village.
Maneesh Chhibber: Why do you think the honeymoon ended so soon for the BJP, just six months into the state Assembly and 100-odd days at the Centre?
The people gave a mandate to the BJP for what they heard on TV or in speeches made by the leadership?investment, growth, jobs, governance, etc. We have a government which was voted in with such high expectations, and then we have the Sangh Parivar and the so-called fringe elements making the kind of statements they have been in order to polarise politics. I think the people of India are very smart and we must give them more credit than we do because they know how to check and balance. The job of the Congress today is to be a robust, strong and pragmatic opposition. It?s far too early to pass judgement on the government, but all that we have seen so far ? the mission to Mars, the railway line to Kashmir ? none of these could have happened in three months.
I often hear the government blaming price rise on ?the bad policies of the UPA government?. Now, if the UPA government is being blamed for the price of onion in Azadpur mandi today, then why must not a tiny bit of credit be given to the UPA for the things we launched?
Ruhi Tewari: How would you assess the performance of the Congress as an opposition in the first 100 days?
We have 44 seats in Parliament. Certainly, we have to see what went wrong, and that takes time. All of us met Mr AK Antony and his team, that report is now with the Congress president. We had an open-hearted talk about what we did wrong and what must be done in the future. So it involves bringing about changes, accepting the problems that lie in candidate selection, campaigning, marketing, communication, etc. But I don?t think it?s time lost, I think it?s time invested.
RajKamal Jha: Would you like to share some of that heart-to-heart which you said you had after the Lok Sabha results?
It?s clear what went wrong. There was not enough communication from the party and government about the work that had been done. The impression left was only scam allegations and the CAG report. The mind-boggling numbers are tattooed in people?s brains… but none has been proved. There?s an inquiry, a court of law, and jurisprudence. People are being chargesheeted, taken to task, nothing was done to put it under the rug. But all the good things the government did, like in telecommunications and information technology, of which I was the minister ? we started the national e-governance programme, earmarked thousands of crores of rupees to make sure every village panchayat in India gets broadband connectivity. It was a new idea and now suddenly, you start talking about e-governance, minimum government and digital India… it?s the same thing. Nobody talks about the achievements of UPA I, UPA II because we haven?t been able to communicate these to the people.
RajKamal Jha: But surely 44 seats is more than just a public relations failure.
I didn?t mean PR. Like I said, we were not able to match the resources deployed by the Opposition to reach people. And in North India, there was subtle polarisation. I don?t believe that the 71 BJP MPs who won in UP were the most deserving candidates. Mr Modi talked about investment and growth and FDIs, but what happened under the watch of Mr Amit Shah was subtle, precise polarisation. Why could Mr (A B) Vajpayee not swing 70 seats for the BJP in UP, and why could Mr Amit Shah do it from Gujarat in two months? What were the tools adopted to do that? It was subcutaneous diversion, not the kind that Mr (LK) Advani did in 1992 ? Shah didn?t ride a rath and say Jai Shri Ram. This was done with small incidents in west UP, in Muzaffarnagar, while the top layer of the BJP was talking about growth, manufacturing, etc. It wasn?t social engineering or campaigning strategy that Mr Amit Shah may take credit for, it was simple polarisation. And you can?t match that with our broadband connectivity story. The good work of the government can?t get the kind of instant votes that religious fervour can.
Maneesh Chhibber: So how do you ensure this doesn?t happen again?
Luckily, the people of this country think ahead of us. Same thing was tried in UP by Sakshi Maharaj. It worked once, so they tried to do it again, and guess what, they were shown the mirror ? ?This can?t work and you?ve got to deliver what you promised?. Nobody from the BJP, including Mr Modi, ever steps up and says that ?love jihad? or the demand to ?make India a Hindu state? is wrong and condemn these so-called fringe elements. I don?t understand how can somebody who is an MP and the campaign committee chairman of UP be a fringe element. It?s very smart ?you do the right thing, check all the boxes, and let the other guys do the ground work and get the votes for you and you just distinguish yourself by saying that these are just fringe elements. So people have realised that it?s not just about what they say, it?s about what they do on the ground. And we as the Congress party will always stand by what is correct, whether it makes political sense to us or not.
Shailaja Bajpai: You referred to the inability of the Congress to communicate its successes during the Lok Sabha elections. What are you doing about that?
First, our plan is to get back to power… To remain in the public domain, to be able to relay our thoughts, we have tried to reach out. For example, for the membership drive in Rajasthan, we decided not to go the conventional way, that of giving parchis at the district block. We reached out to people who are not so political, we got in touch with chambers of commerce, bar associations, rotary clubs, colleges, universities, young doctors, lawyers, engineers, farmer associations across cities and rural areas. It was a new way to reach out to those not so political in nature, and use their platforms like Twitter and Facebook.
We feel that it is up to us to reach out to the people. We must not be complacent that, with time, people will get wary of the BJP and they will come and talk to us. We have got to start reinventing how and what we do. And for that we need to communicate. We need all sorts of traditional communication channels as well as new ones. It has to be a culmination of both ? Facebook, village to village, door to door, house to house, shop to shop. You will see the results in terms of our communication.
Manoj CG: In the Lok Sabha elections, the Congress?s definition of secularism was perceived by some to be minority-ism or being pro-Muslim, which cost the party. What is your take on that?
How can there be two definitions of secularism? Secularism is what it is. Not what I or somebody else defines it as. I feel that it is the responsibility of the majority to protect the minority. The Muslims in Kashmir must protect the Hindus and Sikhs there. Hindus must protect Muslims in UP.
Abhishek Angad*: You spoke about Amit Shah using polarisation to win 71 seats in UP in the Lok Sabha polls. But in the larger picture, do you think India rejected the Congress?s idea of secularism?
You can take what you want out of it. The fact is we got 44 seats. Now if you want to say India rejected our definition of secularism, India rejected the Congress party, India rejected me, I have to say yes to it, because we lost. When you lose, you will be blamed for everything. An election loss is not going to dictate the future of the Congress and its opportunities. We lost because of many reasons and, at this point, no matter what you say, I will have to agree with you. Now how do we regenerate ourselves?it?s a much larger question. We must focus all our energies on the future and on getting out of this loss.
I was campaigning in Rajasthan, there are 61 panchayats in a place in Bharatpur. My mind was focused on how I should cover those 61 panchayats. I never realised that when the results come out and when we win, it will have a much larger national impact. Your mind doesn?t work like that. I was just focused on how how to touch every village and, once we did that, polling happened, counting happened, we won. I was still in Jaipur, and was thinking of those four seats. It?s only when I came to Delhi, read the papers and watched TV that I realised the impact these by-elections could have in Haryana and Maharashtra.
I also think that the BJP having lost in Rajasthan has given Uddhav Thackeray a lot to talk about and demand many more seats from the BJP. Across the country, people and the Congress workers now feel that the BJP and Mr Modi are not invincible. You can beat them. You can defeat the BJP at the polls.
Raghvendra Rao: After the Lok Sabha defeat, what exactly was your message or your strategy when you went out to the voters in the bypolls? What exactly turned it around for you in the bypolls?
I was honest with the electorate. I said look, you voted for the BJP, for nine months did the state government fulfil any of its promises? Vasundharaji (Raje) promised 15 lakh jobs every year; it?s a different story that Rajasthan has 6.5 lakh government employees. They have shut down 17,000 schools. She promised 24-hour electricity and now she?s saying we are not getting coal. So there was disillusionment about the government. We told people that these by-elections wouldn?t change the government of the day, we have to suffer the government for four years, but that by electing the Congress, you will give a message to the BJP that it must work for the promises it has given you. That message was very clear.
I felt that after the Lok Sabha elections in Rajasthan, young people came back to the Congress fold. If it wasn?t for the young people?s strength, we could not have taken on the state machinery, with the kind of money power they were pumping in. Our management was better. We did poll management like surgical precision. That?s what we were doing day in and day out. And that?s what helped us win the elections.
Transcribed by Aneesha Mathur & Shalini Narayan
* EXIMS student