Big Brother in Backseat: Why Congress Picked Victory Over Ego to Ally With AAP, SP

In a lease of life for the INDIA front, a deal has been struck between the Samajwadi Party and Congress on one hand and the Aam Aadmi Party and Congress on the other. But the clincher was the Grand Old Party accepting the fact that it would not be stubborn and was ready to climb down.

Let’s first look at the SP-Congress talks. It took three meetings, a defiant SP and the exit of RLD for the Congress to realise that it would have to be realistic and ready to bend. While Akhilesh Yadav had assured the Congress that he would join the Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra in either Amethi or Raebareli, he skipped it, upsetting the Congress. To make it worse, Yadav said he would join the Yatra only after seat sharing was cleared. He went a step ahead and announced tickets for 11 seats — two of them being those on which Congress had to fight.

Meanwhile, Priyanka Vadra may have had to skip the Yatra, but she was doing all the backroom negotiations. Sources close to her told News18: “With her speaking to Akhilesh Yadav, the alliance took the final shape.” But the realistic politician that Priyanka Vadra is, she conveyed it to top leaders, including Rahul Gandhi, that it’s best to compromise a little. A win is more important than ego.

The harsh reality is that the Congress has only one Lok Sabha seat in UP’s Raebareli. Also, in the last elections, the Congress lost deposit on 12 of the 17 seats on which it has been given tickets now. Sources say Priyanka Vadra has been asking for and given all such data and she realised that being stubborn would hurt the Congress more than the SP.

Unlike SP, BSP and BJP, Congress no longer has any committed voter base in the state. Also, the exit of Jayant Chaudhary was seen as a setback and the Congress didn’t want to take any more chances.

To come to AAP and Congress, the win in the Supreme Court on the Chandigarh councillor polls left both the parties elated. Despite some naysayers in the Congress upset over seat sharing in Delhi and Punjab, the truce that Rahul Gandhi and Mallikarjun Kharge agreed to was that while Punjab would be off limit, in Delhi the Congress was keen to go ahead.

Congress initially asked for four seats but when Rahul Gandhi, Kharge and KC Venugopal intervened — sensing the fact that it hardly has any leaders who can contest — the party agreed to fight for less and agreed on three seats. While AAP was ready to give Chandni Chowk, East and Northeast, Congress wanted New Delhi too.

However, with exodus, slow momentum, and the fact that it has little base left in the North, the Congress has seen the writing on the wall and decided to settle for a compromise. Many would see this as a mighty climb down by the once Grand Old Party.