He believes the Sangathan Srijan Abhiyan (SSA), which interprets as organisation re-creation marketing campaign – the Congress’s new experiment in management choice – provides staff like him a uncommon likelihood to interrupt by way of entrenched hierarchies. “In the conventional course of issues, my age and relative stature would have gone towards me,” Dewangan admits with a smile.
An appointment course of that sits neatly between “the same old nominations” and a full-fledged organisational election, the SSA entails impartial observers from different States shortlisting six potential contenders for the publish of District Congress Committee (DCC) president.
The 850 DCC presidents have turn into the focus of the get together’s revival programme. Under the DCCs, there are three different tiers: block-, mandal-, and booth-level management.
The SSA was adopted in April on the Ahmedabad session of the All India Congress Committee (AICC), a central decision-making physique that’s on the high of the get together’s organisational construction. The different tiers embrace the Congress Working Committee that runs the get together’s day by day affairs, the Pradesh Congress Committee that consists of heads of States, and the DCCs for which heads are being chosen. The observers for the DCC choice course of belong to the AICC.
Once termed “the Congress System” by political scientist Rajni Kothari to explain the get together’s dominance in India’s political system, the get together’s cumbersome equipment is beset with each inside and exterior issues in the present day. Critics argue that its extremely centralised management and dynastic predilections have stymied the expansion of grassroots staff. Externally, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and its Hindutva platform have modified India’s political narrative, with the Congress struggling to supply an efficient counter.
Though it has almost six crore members, the 139-year-old get together’s political footprint has steadily declined over time. The Congress has not been in energy on the Centre since 2014 and is ruling solely three States – Karnataka, Telangana, and Himachal Pradesh – of the nation’s 28. It is now hoping to create a extra agile and accountable construction by combining youth outreach, conducting performance-based critiques, and balancing social illustration by way of the SSA.
“After the Udaipur Declaration [of May 2022], Rahul Gandhi [Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha] and Mallikarjun Kharge [Congress president] began this initiative. Under this, it was determined that fifty% of district presidents can be beneath the age of fifty,” says former Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot. He hopes that the endeavour will keep true to the plan and that the AICC is not going to find yourself choosing candidates of its selection with out contemplating advantage.
The DCCs have been empowered to take each political choices and share monetary obligations for his or her areas. They may also be held accountable for his or her efficiency, which will probably be measured by way of organisation-building proper as much as the polling sales space, election administration, ground-level exercise, and responsiveness to the calls for of get together staff. So far, the get together has undertaken the train in 10 States, starting with Gujarat.
Grassroots staff discover their voice
In the sooner system of appointing DCC presidents, the heads of Pradesh Congress Committees would hand-pick their nominees. Now, folks can apply for the job.
“It isn’t typically that somebody like me may even be talked about as a contender. Usually, those that orbit round senior leaders routinely make the minimize. This time, even standing within the ring issues,” Dewangan says.
One of his rivals is the son of a former Pradesh Congress Committee president, however Dewangan insists that’s exactly why the method issues. “It will energise the cadre,” he says, talking for a whole lot of different hopefuls.
In Chhattisgarh’s capital, Raipur, preliminary discussions have begun to slender down the checklist of six candidates for the agricultural and metropolis organisations. There are 41 organisational districts within the State the place the get together has suffered a hat-trick of defeats, together with the Assembly election of December 2023.
At the Raipur district workplace, the place AICC observer Prafulla Vinodrao Gudadhe from Maharashtra is holding marathon conferences with almost 300 office-bearers, the temper is upbeat. Contenders wait within the hall clutching their nomination papers and rehearsing their pitches. Discussions are lengthy, typically tense, however for a lot of, that is the closest they’ve come to being heard.
“Even if I make it to the shortlist, it raises my stature. At least now I’ll be seen as being on a par with an MLA,” says an aspirant in his 40s who doesn’t want to be named.
Leaders map progress
(From left) AICC basic secretary Bhupesh Baghel, Congress basic secretary (organisation) Okay.C. Venugopal, Punjab get together chief Amrinder Singh Raja Warring, Congress MP from Tamil Nadu Sashikanth Senthil, and former Punjab Chief Minister Charanjit Singh Channi throughout a gathering at Indira Bhavan, the get together headquarters in New Delhi that was inaugurated in January this yr. | Photo Credit: SHASHI SHEKHAR KASHYAP
Over 1,100 km away, Congress chief Okay.C. Venugopal, the person who’s main the get together’s revival efforts as basic secretary (organisation), is busy assembly leaders from Punjab together with the AICC basic secretary in command of the State, Bhupesh Baghel, to overview the organisation-building train. Bureaucrat-turned-politician Sashikanth Senthil, who represents Tamil Nadu’s Tiruvallur constituency within the Lok Sabha, additionally joins the dialogue as he heads the Congress struggle room. Former Punjab Chief Minister Charanjit Singh Channi and State Congress chief Amrinder Singh Raja Warring wait for his or her flip to satisfy Venugopal.
“Observers, guided by the Congress president and Rahul Gandhiji, spend per week in every district, consulting hundreds of native staff and group leaders. This is essentially the most participatory choice course of the get together has ever undertaken,” Venugopal says between his conferences at Indira Bhavan, the get together headquarters in New Delhi that was inaugurated in January this yr.
He says the get together’s evaluation reveals that it’s increasing wherever the organisational construction – from block to sales space committees – is robust.
“Now, appointments are primarily based on session and efficiency, making certain group illustration and grassroots energy. Not all DCCs carry out equally effectively, however we’re monitoring their work day by day, assigning clear duties and verifying outcomes,” he says, warning that those that fail to ship will probably be changed inside 5 to 6 months. This accountability is a part of the get together’s new experiment.
Venugopal, with the assistance of the Congress struggle room, screens the progress of duties given to district items each fortnight or so. From door-to-door campaigns of the get together’s nationwide drives towards alleged vote theft and the particular intensive revision of electoral rolls to defending the constitutional rights of individuals, the organisational revamp additionally seeks to maintain get together staff engaged. “The purpose is to take the Congress’s ideology to the bottom, rebuild booth-level committees, and produce influential native figures into the organisation. The greatest benefit now could be knowledge. For the primary time, we now have detailed info on each district,” the senior Congress chief provides because the get together maps its presence right down to the polling sales space degree.
He says the get together has additionally begun large-scale 10-day coaching camps wherein Gandhi will take part. “The Congress’s core message is straightforward: stand by the Constitution, shield the marginalised, and empower native leaders to rebuild the get together from the underside up,” he says.
Odisha finds hope
The Congress final got here to energy in Odisha in 1995 underneath the late J.B. Patnaik, with Giridhar Gamango and the late Hemanand Biswal subsequently main short-lived stints.
The 1999 Super Cyclone marked a watershed second not solely within the State’s historical past of disasters but in addition in its politics because the State authorities’s faltering response and allegations of corruption severely dented its credibility. With the emergence of Naveen Patnaik of the Biju Janata Dal (BJD), who reshaped Odisha’s political panorama, the Congress’s electoral presence within the State steadily eroded. Between 1995 and 2024, its vote share declined from 39.1% to 13.4%.
The causes are each structural and political: a weakened cadre community, recurrent factionalism, and the shortcoming to counter both the BJD’s organisational dominance or the BJP’s speedy growth within the State.
Under the SSA, 35 new DCC chiefs – a mixture of senior functionaries and youthful entrants, many of their 30s – have been introduced on September 26 in Odisha. “As per the SSA framework, district- and State-level struggle rooms will monitor actions by way of a stay digital dashboard. Every sales space committee have to be absolutely practical forward of polls,” says OPCC chief Bhakta Charan Das.
The first check of the renewed management will come within the Nuapada Assembly bypoll, the place the get together hopes for a morale-boosting efficiency. Later in November, Gandhi is predicted to carry an orientation session for brand spanking new DCC chiefs because the get together seeks to rebuild the organisation within the State.
Not everybody’s glad
Yet, the joy has its shadows. Despite discuss of inclusivity and the Udaipur Declaration promising wider illustration, few girls are seen within the race. Some say DCC chiefs are nonetheless being appointed on the advice of AICC observers. A celebration insider claimed that in Madhya Pradesh a DCC chief was appointed regardless of the candidate not even making it to the shortlist.
Many draw a parallel between the brand new appointment course of and Gandhi’s “failed experiment” to nominate Youth Congress chiefs by way of U.S.-style primaries.
Gehlot feels no Congress chief ought to suggest names to the AICC observers, in order that the choice course of stays honest and clear. “After the choice, all leaders ought to welcome and help the newly appointed district presidents. The Congress will solely turn into stronger after we all work along with unity and loyalty to the organisation,” he says.
Gehlot needed to intervene when get together staff in Rajasthan went on strike demanding that the get together excessive command observe the earlier sample of appointments. “We have seen such opposition in Haryana too, however we don’t approve of this kind of conduct,” Venugopal says, outlining that one of many goals of the revamp is to replicate a wider social composition of the management.
In Haryana, the get together’s slender defeat within the October 2024 Assembly election – by lower than 1% of the votes – spurred introspection and urgency. Despite excessive expectations of a win, the Congress’s organisational weak point on the district degree was obtrusive, particularly in contrast with the BJP’s in depth ‘panna pramukh’ community to get its supporters to the sales space.
The SSA spurred the get together out of an 11-year paralysis. All 32 DCC presidents have been appointed, balancing communities and factions throughout the get together. Ten of the brand new district presidents come from teams belonging to the Backward Classes. The get together goals to succeed in communities comprising almost 40% of Haryana’s citizens.
The lone lady DCC president within the State, Santosh Beniwal, says it might take one other month for the complete organisational construction to be in place as the method to arrange government committees at district and block ranges is underneath means. “The district presidents have despatched the checklist for the chief committees, every comprising 31 members, for the district and sales space ranges. It will probably be adopted by appointments at mandal ranges,” she says.
In neighbouring Punjab, the place the get together witnessed intense factionalism earlier, Leader of the Opposition Partap Singh Bajwa says the train has helped reinvigorate grassroots staff. “The Sanghatan Srijan Abhiyan isn’t a routine membership or outreach drive – it’s a bottom-up organisational rebuilding train. Unlike different campaigns that centered primarily on mobilisation throughout elections, this initiative is about institutional renewal and strengthening of the Congress at each degree – sales space, block, and district.”
Bajwa provides that the get together is utilizing data-driven suggestions mechanisms to guage efficiency and participation, and to attach with the actual points of individuals – particularly farmers, youth, and small entrepreneurs. “It is about rebuilding the Congress organisation, not simply reactivating it.”
(Shubhomoy Sikdar in Raipur, Satyasundar Barik in Bhubaneswar, and Ashok Kumar in Gurugram; with inputs from Vikas Vasudeva in Chandigarh.)
Edited by Sunalini Mathew
