The effort to take the Trinamul Congress footprint beyond Bengal is a project minted by Mamata Banerjee’s political strategist Prashant Kishor.
The central assumption of the strategy is that the Gandhi-led Congress is in “irretrievable decline” and can, therefore, no longer be the pivot of the Opposition.
Kishor is convinced that the Bengal chief minister can become the axis around which an “effective and credible” opposition to the Narendra Modi-led government can be built, especially so after her emphatic victory in the Assembly polls this summer.
Former JDU leader Pavan Varma, who joined Trinamul on Tuesday, has articulated the need for building a “non-Gandhi-led Congress” repeatedly in recent weeks.
Varma, known to work and strategise closely with Kishor, has been making two important points — that an effective Opposition is essential to the functioning of a democracy and that the Congress, because of its internal problems and organisational stagnation, is no longer capable of appearing as a credible Opposition, either to non-BJP parties or to the public at large.
Kishor, who has earlier worked closely with the Congress leadership, is said to share the view that the Gandhis are not amenable to imagining or implementing strategies that are required to take on the Modi dispensation.
There was speculation a few months ago that Kishor was negotiating an arrangement with the Congress to work towards a blueprint for the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, but nothing came of it.
Kishor’s sense, according to those who work closely with him, is that the Gandhis are not only indecisive but also unwilling to provide new, and required, organisational impetus to the party.
One of the chief symptoms of this, the Kishor camp argues, is the prolonged uncertainty that has attended the leadership question: an ailing Sonia Gandhi is active party boss; Rahul Gandhi has taken no decisive steps towards taking ownership as leader or having an effective leader other than himself or anyone in his family installed.
It is moot whether the Trinamul Congress can evolve into India’s new GOP under Mamata, but manoeuvres undertaken in recent weeks and months clearly demonstrate that such ambition has been triggered into action.
The wooing of Sushmita Dev from the Congress on the promise that she would be the Trinamul face in Tripura, the acquisition by the party of prominent Goan leaders and the bid for power on unfamiliar territory, and the near open invitation to Congress people of all hues to join the Mamata camp are all indicators that the Kishor project is to ramp up Trinamul from a regional party to a national player.
As Mamata herself indicated on Wednesday in Delhi, she will probably begin to reach out to other regional players who could, potentially, become part of a loose Opposition coalition.
Over the last few years, Kishor has become a widely networked entity with close links to the Thackerays of Maharashtra and the chief ministers of Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh, M.K. Stalin and Jagan Mohan Reddy.
It is also learnt that Kishor is working the lines with several disgruntled elements within the Congress and several may join Trinamul in the weeks and months to come.
That Mamata did not seek an appointment with Sonia on her current trip to Delhi — the two continue to maintain cordial personal relations — is indicative of the truth of soured ties.
Mamata is willing to poach on the Congress; the Congress evidently isn’t pleased with the way she is being projected as the emerging national alternative.
Kishor isn’t someone who plays with too many cards revealed, but it is increasingly apparent that Mamata is the trump he is playing the political table with.
