May 2, 2021, will be a decisive day for many politicians and their political parties with the EVMs set to give away their political fortunes in four states and a Union Territory. For one politician, though, personal stakes in the polls are way higher than that of his party. And that politician is former Congress president Rahul Gandhi - for whom the poll results will be no less than a make-or-break moment.

As things stand, the debacle in the Assembly elections may not throw the other prominent leaders in jeopardy since their authority has hardly ever been challenged and they continue to hold sway over their political parties irrespective of the outcomes of the elections. Congress leader Rahul Gandhi can't boast of the same privilege.

The reluctant scion of the Nehru-Gandhi clan took the reins of the Congress in 2017 only to relinquish it after his electoral defeat in the family bastion of Amethi and the crushing rout of the party in the 2019 parliamentary elections. What surprised everyone that while Rahul Gandhi customarily took the onus of his party's abysmal performance, he sternly pointed the finger at the politics of the BJP. In a sharply-worded resignation letter, he accused the saffron party of “systematically crushing the voice of the Indian people" by marshalling the entire machinery of the Indian state against the opposition.

Before training his guns at the BJP, in the four-page letter posted on Twitter, Rahul Gandhi had advised the Congress leaders to find someone else to lead the party. The move was measured by political analysts as a dare to the cynics in the Congress to elect someone from out of the Nehru-Gandhi family.

Around two years later, now there is a growing buzz in the Congress that Rahul Gandhi may return as the party president. But perhaps that is subject to the results of the Assembly polls as he reportedly intends to take charge from the position of strength. And to secure his standing, Rahul Gandhi has left no stone unturned in the election campaignings, strategically choosing to focus on the states and the UT with rosy prospects.

The Congress hopes that the anti-incumbency factor will help it ride to power in both Kerala and Assam which is why Rahul Gandhi essentially concentrated on these two states with maximum public rallies. The party banks on the same factor in Tamil Nadu where it is in alliance with the DMK along with the Left and other regional parties. So, Rahul Gandhi rallied hard for the Secular Progressive Alliance in Tamil Nadu and campaigned in Union Territory Puducherry alongside where the Congress expects to return to power on the sympathy votes after the fall of its government due to the alleged 'poaching' of its MLAs.

All this while, Rahul Gandhi conspicuously avoided electioneering in West Bengal, nor Priyanka Gandhi was seen in the state, who extensively championed for the party in Assam and made the rounds of Kerala and Tamil Nadu as well. It seems the sole reason behind this plan of action was not to bet on the wrong horse.

Perhaps, Congress acknowledges that the party is not in the race to form the government in West Bengal as the TMC and the BJP are in a direct contest in the state. If the 2019 general elections are any yardstick, the Congress finished a distant third with only 4.76 percent vote share and 2 seats, while the BJP put up a brave fight grabbing 18 seats against the TMC, which bagged 22 out of the 42 Lok Sabha seats in Bengal. In the 2016 Assembly elections, the Congress was a stronger force than the BJP, winning 44 out of 294 Assembly seats in the state (against TMC's 211), whereas the BJP managed to bag only 3 seats. But the difference of vote share between the Congress (12.25 percent) and the BJP (10.16 percent) was not huge.

Ostensibly, Rahul Gandhi and his team weighed out these numbers and decided to devote full-time in less iffy regions, while leaders like Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury kept things moving for the Congress in West Bengal canvassing the constituencies.

Now that the voting is over in the other states and Union Territory, Rahul Gandhi is likely to turn his attention to West Bengal launching his poll campaigns as four more phases of elections remain to take place. If so, clearly, the former Congress Chief wants to make the best of the opportunity at hand in raising the prospects of the party in Bengal.

Notably, between 17 to 29 April, 159 Assembly seats are going to the polls in Bengal, including the constituencies in Muslim majority districts of Malda, Murshidabad and North Dinajpur, which are traditionally the Congress strongholds. This time, the 'Sanjukta Morcha' of the Congress and the Left Front may further benefit from bringing Furfura Sharif's Pirzada Abbas Siddiqui into the alliance, whose Indian Secular Front may eat into the Muslim vote bank of the TMC in the entire region. However, while the remaining four rounds of elections are crucial for the 'Morcha', the BJP is planning to target both the Congress and the TMC hoping to benefit from a three-corner contest.

Thus, from Kerala to Assam and Tamil Nadu to Puducherry, Rahul Gandhi seems to have devised distinct strategies giving his best shot at victory, while in West Bengal he aims at gaining a foothold for the Congress.

Seemingly, West Bengal may not have been on top of his priority list for poll campaigns as he chose to dedicate more time to the high-stakes states. But the argument that Rahul Gandhi stayed away from Bengal to avoid any dent into the TMC vote share in its fight against the BJP is difficult to buy - if he finally lands up in the state for the public rallies.

The other line of thought seems even more implausible that Rahul Gandhi eschewed West Bengal because it would have looked incongruous for the Congress to lambast the Left Front in Kerala and share the dais with the Left leaders in Bengal. One should not disregard the fact that barring Kerala the Congress has been in alliance with the Left parties in all other states (however insignificant their presence be) and Rahul Gandhi didn't shy away from campaigning for the alliance in those states.

All said and done, while Rahul Gandhi waits for a reasonable opening to redeem the post that he had renounced in 2019, the re-ascension plan may defer in the event of disappointing poll results on May 2, 2021. Needless to say, though, that Congress requires a full-time President before the crucial Punjab, Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand and Goa elections in 2022.

Om Tiwari is a Delhi-based journalist and columnist. The views expressed are personal

Click to read his other columns

(Edited by : Aditi Gautam)

First Published:Apr 12, 2021 2:54 PM IST