Rahul Gandhi’s Speech in Parliament Marks a Defining Moment Badri Raina https://janataweekly.org/rahul-gandhis-speech-in-parliament-marks-a-defining-moment/ February 13, 2022
nothing offends the principle of federalism as much as the prime minister’s sickeningly repetitive reference to the desirability of “double engine” governments; this averment clearly suggests that the ruler may be expected to shower bounties only on those states who elect his party to power – a stipulation deeply obnoxious both to the democratic structure and to constitutional principles. And, yet, no section of the media seems to want to make even the least comment on this propagation of the “double engine” thesis.
Rahul Gandhi thus suggested why the assumption of a centralised autocracy lorded over by a “ruler of rulers” was grossly inimical to the genius of India’s diverse history and polity, and would not but draw reactions in time that could dangerously vitiate the peace and harmony of the realm.
In pointing to the fact that the constitution defined India as a “union of states” and not a homogeneous “nation”, Rahul Gandhi laid a firm ideological ground for the conviction that only a negotiated cooperative federalism could hope to both keep the republic together and meet the ends of the democratic and egalitarian ideals enshrined in the constitution.
It has been pointed out by political observers that the Congress itself bears substantial responsibility for having debilitated federalism of the sort Rahul Gandhi enunciated in his watershed speech, beginning with the dismissal of the first ever elected communist government in Kerala in 1959.
This cannot be denied. And, Rahul Gandhi’s offering would have been doubly persuasive if he had made some acknowledgement of that reality, although it does seem that the firmness with which he has now formulated his understanding of India’s diversely rich and inter-active social and cultural history, he will not shy at some future point to do so.
Clearly, the thrust of Rahul Gandhi’s stated ideological vision here poses a challenge to the “demonic” hegemonisation sought by the Hindutva right-wing, (as his seminal departure from some previously disabling thinking within the Congress may be set to be jettisoned), preparing the party for a sentient equation with regional forces that have hitherto tended to view the grand old party as yet another oppressive behemoth.
if Rahul Gandhi has indeed put the grand old party on a reworked scheme of political and cultural perceptions and relations, including an increasingly forthright jettisoning of the temptation to ape cultural majoritarianism in favour of secular platforms of praxis, the country may have been given a choice it has lacked over a decade or so of its political life.
