Thiruvananthapuram Member of Parliament Shashi Tharoor might run for Congress president. A final call is awaited. The last time the 66-year-old fought a non-parliamentary election, he aimed for the moon! But the moon was out of his orbit. This time, if he does contest, and he was still mulling the decision, he would be aiming for the scorching sun! Last heard, Tharoor held his cards close to the chest. And Tharoor was asking for a “free and fair” election, which is an insult to Congress and translates to chances of electoral fraud! Also, he wanted simultaneous elections for filling up 12 CWC vacancies. What does Tharoor want? The Congress presidential election has been officially announced, but the ground is also being prepared to return Rahul Gandhi to the stewardship of the 137-year-old party. If Tharoor goes ahead and contests annoying the Congress high command, it is quite likely that he will have a taste of the ‘free and fair’ polls he has been looking for.
Even otherwise, electoral rolls are heavily decked to favour Gandhi over wannabe foolhardy pretenders, Tharoor included. It is also common knowledge when a vote is cast for a Gandhi family member, that vote is for the entire clan, in toto. That said, once in a blue moon, Congress leaders forget they kowtow to the Gandhi family. These days the blue moon is waxing, and the “Gandhis” are fair game. Otherwise, politician-cum-legal eagle Kapil Sibal wouldn’t have walked away. And rebel-at-73 Ghulam Nabi Azad wouldn’t have penned the utterly disrespectful letter to Sonia Gandhi! It took nearly two and half years for the G-23 to cast even half-hearted salvos against the mother-son high command. If the Gandhis, Rahul Gandhi in particular, hadn’t succeeded in undermining their standing in the eyes of the general public, there wouldn’t be a need for a Congress presidential election. Things would have continued as they were for as long as the Gandhi family wanted, ad nauseam.
Leaders like Malikarjun Kharge, Harish Rawat, and Jairam Ramesh wouldn’t give Tharoor a chance in a billion. For them, without a Gandhi at the helm, the Congress would go to the dogs. The 2019 election was fought in Rahul’s name. Can the 2024 elections be fought in Shashi Tharoor’s name; Ashok Gehlot’s, or Sachin Pilot’s name? There wouldn’t be self-immolations, but most Congress rank and file believe only Rahul Gandhi has been building on the 12 crore vote-bank of 2019. Only Rahul Gandhi has been fighting Modi. Nobody remembers Ghulam Nabi Azad or Kapil Sibal campaigning in 2019. Only Rahul Gandhi stood on the burning deck, the captain of the ship! Nevertheless, the build-up for “Rahul Gandhi for Congress President” is too far gone for anybody to buck the trend. Only the foolhardy will, and that at his peril. Chances are on the day of the election, with Kharge and Rawat high up on the mast, there would only be Rahul Gandhi standing on the deck, listening to the “tintinnabulation”, which word-o-maniac Tharoor should know stands for the “ringing or sounding of bells”.
