After being on the road for nearly five days, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi’s Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra ended its run in Madhya Pradesh on March 6, with party workers in the areas it covered saying that the march has re-energised the cadre ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
Mr. Gandhi, who entered the State on March 2 from Morena in the Gwalior-Chambal region, concluded the yatra in Ratlam of the Malwa-Nimar region. After staying the night in Ratlam, he will enter Rajasthan on Thursday. The yatra covered more than 650 km and passed through eight Lok Sabha constituencies, with Mr. Gandhi holding various public meetings, nukkad sabhas, and roadshows.
In most of the public events, Mr. Gandhi’s main plank remained a nationwide caste census as he launched scathing attacks at Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the ruling BJP, accusing them of doing social and economic injustice to Dalits, tribals and OBCs, who, he said, formed about 73% of India’s population. Claiming that the 73% population was not getting proper representation in both public and private sectors, the former Congress president pitched the idea of a caste census as a solution. The party has already promised to conduct the exercise if it is voted to power at the Centre.
Massive defeat
Several Congress workers from Ratlam and Mandsaur Lok Sabha seats, who were waiting for Mr. Gandhi at Ratlam’s Favvara Chowk with flags and roses in their hands, said the march has given a morale booster to party workers across the State, who had only in November last year suffered a massive defeat in the Assembly elections.
Satya Narayan Laxcar, a Congress councillor from Mandsaur, where his party had lost seven out of eight Assembly seats under the Lok Sabha constituency, said the party workers in his area were not willing to step out of the house after the State polls.
“It had come to a point where we were conducting local meetings but workers were not turning up at all. They were also scared of the BJP workers as they did not have any strong representation in the region to support them,” said Mr. Laxcar, who is also a PCC delegate.
He, however, added, “But today you can see hundreds of workers from Mandsaur have come here. Our place is about 90 km from here but even small workers have spent from their own pockets and come here. The reason is that they relate to what Rahul ji is fighting for.”
Echoing his voice, Faruq Patel, a Congress worker from Ratlam’s Malwasa village, said the workers only step out if they see that there is someone to lead them.
“There was a sort of a blank after the Assembly polls. Even though Jitu Patwari [PCC president appointed after the November polls] was travelling the State and trying to connect with workers, there was a sense that Lok Sabha polls are so close and it is very difficult to change the mood in such a short time,” said Mr. Patel, while claiming that five days of continuous activity in different regions have given enough fodder to the local party leaders to go and seek votes on issues.
Raghav Kaushal, Gwalior district Youth Congress working president, said a major reason for party workers’ low morale after the result was “completely unexpected”.
‘More shocked than sad’
“The mood before the Assembly polls was completely in our favour. We don’t know what happened, whether it was EVM or what. But we were more shocked than sad,” he said, adding that Mr. Gandhi raising issues of ‘Agniveers’ has given the young workers a subject to connect with the region’s youth.
The Gwalior-Chambal belt sees a significant number of youth joining the armed forces and the region had seen intense protests against the Centre’s Agnipath Scheme when it was introduced in 2022.
“We are now planning to take the issue to each village and talk to youth on this,” he said.
Some workers, however, believed that the cadre’s energy will only remain if the “right candidates are fielded” and claimed that “small level leaders and their opinions were not being valued” in the party.
A functionary in Congress’ businessmen wing of Ratlam district, who did not wish to be named, said, “No feedback is taken from us on candidate selection. In Assembly polls, it was done by those sitting in Bhopal and now it will be done from Delhi.”
The leader claimed that the Congress lost the Ratlam Lok Sabha seat in 2014 and 2019, and many Assembly seats under it due to the infighting between some prominent leaders.
“You can check that whenever [former State Minister] Kanjilal Bhuria and [former MLA] Xavier Meda have put their rivalry aside, the Congress has won,” he said, adding that it would have been better “if Rahul ji had also kept some time to sit and talk with workers to take their opinion”.
“Because, nobody is listening to us in Bhopal,” he said.
“The sitting MP from Ratlam [BJP’s Guman Singh Damor] did not work here at all. The BJP got its feedback from the ground and fielded a fresh face this time. This kind of system is missing in our party,” the leader said.
The eight Lok Sabha constituencies Mr. Gandhi’s yatra passed through — Morena, Gwalior, Guna, Rajgarh, Dewas, Ujjain, Dhar, and Ratlam — are currently held by the BJP, which had won 28 out of 29 seats in Madhya Pradesh in 2019 parliamentary elections. The Congress had only managed to bag one seat, Chhindwara, won by the then Chief Minister Kamal Nath’s son Nakul Nath.
The BJP has already announced its candidates for 24 seats, while the Congress is yet to declare names for any seat.
