No trust motion played out like a day-long drama on Friday. Moments like the Congress president Rahul Gandhi’s hug to the Prime Minister Narendra Modi made for a big media story. Congress president’s passionate speech, however, was an attempt to set the narrative for the 2019 election. And this narrative was about pitting the ‘Congress love’ against the ‘BJP hate’.
The statements that he loved the Prime Minister despite his party’s hate for him was an attempt to drive this point home. And also that he would continue to love the BJP and work towards transforming their hate into love. It was clear Gandhi was attempting to become a real-life Munnabhai MBBS and trying to win over Modi through a jaddu ki jhappi. Did he succeed in this? The jury is yet to be out on this. But if we go by the performance alone, he didn’t carry it off well enough. Gandhi cut an awkward figure. He, however, partly succeeded in carrying the message home, pitting love against hate.
There were many deliberate omissions in Gandhi’s speech though. He didn’t use the word secular but tried to put his points across through the medium of Hindu terminology. Hence invocation of the Hindu God Shivji. Or the statement like how he had been taught by the BJP’s hate politics to become a compassionate Hindu.
Overall, the speech once again showed Gandhi in his new confident avatar. Congress president is a better challenger now than he was previously. One good thing is that Gandhi has shown some promise to rise up to the challenge, even though his image makeover is still a project in works. As his Lok Sabha speech underlined, his speeches now carry more conviction. He has paid attention to his communication style: one, he has copied Modis jumla style of speech delivery. Two, he now frames his arguments in a way that generate a bigger ideological contestation with the BJP albeit, he has still a way to go to match Modis overarching ideological challenge. And this Modi demonstrated in his response to him. He showed that his jumla style of speech delivery is an art of his own making and that few people can beat him in this. Gandhi can ape it but not excel in it. Modi remains the master.
Though Gandhi has tried to create his own political narrative but he is using a soft Hindutva language to get it across. So, in his speech while he did name Dalits and other marginalised groups, he didn’t use the Muslim word lest his party is seen partial to the community. Such diffidence about championing the cause of secularism or the Muslim victims of the Hindutva politics makes the Congress leader look pusillanimous in his ideological outlook. Modi’s jumlas work because he has a robust ideology to back it up. Gandhi will similarly need an underpinning of a regenerative narrative if his jumlas have to work.
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