Congress’ Deputy Leader in the Rajya Sabha Anand Sharma, who is among the 23 leaders who expressed concern over the state of the party in a letter to party chief Sonia Gandhi, said the Congress needs a new narrative to tackle the challenges facing the nation.

Why did you all feel the need to express your views in writing? Could you not have met Ms Gandhi and expressed your concerns?

As political activists and leaders who have given an entire lifetime to the Congress party, we have been concerned over the developments of recent years — the rise of the BJP and the political narrative being dominated by their divisive agenda; a subversion of institutions that uphold the foundational values of the Republic. We felt there is an environment of fear, people are increasingly feeling helpless as there is a delay and denial of justice.

Now, many of us were discussing these issues after the 2019 defeat of the party. There could be multiple factors which led to the electoral outcome. And we, as members of the Congress Working Committee (CWC) and party leaders, submit ourselves to collective accountability. I for one, do not believe in apportioning blame.

But having said that, we cannot ignore that there has been a drift and uncertainty in the party after the second disastrous defeat. There is a great sense of urgency to restore the balance in the political narrative by re-energising the Indian National Congress (INC).

There has not been any physical meeting in the last five months. Had that been possible, we would have gone, sat across the table and discussed our concerns frankly and openly and given our proposals. But we had strong reservations on discussing sensitive organisational issues through virtual platforms. I want to clear the air that the letter was written in the best of the interests of the INC, reaffirming of our commitment to the Congress ideology.

But the timing of the letter was questioned by the CWC members including Rahul Gandhi. Many others slammed the letter writers at the CWC meet.

I want to put this on record that we have the highest respect for Ms. Sonia Gandhi. And for us to upset her and hurt her in any manner is unthinkable. I do not know from where the timing issue comes. It is 15 months after the defeat. It’s unfortunate this was misunderstood. This letter was signed by all the signatories somewhere around July 25 but Ms. Gandhi was not well and her health is of paramount importance to us. So the letter was actually sent on August 8 when she had recovered. There is some misunderstanding there.

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There was an orchestrated campaign that started the day before the CWC. That should not have happened. What saddened me is that we were given sermons by people who had betrayed Indira Gandhi when the Shah Commission was set up, abused Sanjay Gandhi and left the Congress while many of us faced police lathis, went to jail and still carry injury marks.

But the letter mentions the CWC failing to give direction to the party and the need for a “full time and visible leadership”

No, we have talked visible leadership at every level. In my view, we can’t be meeting just to react to an agenda set by the BJP or the government. After 15 months, we should have had a roadmap for revival. We expected the issues to be discussed freely and fairly. Ms. Gandhi herself said there are some suggestions that were worth discussing but there was no discussion.

What we meant is that the CWC in its collective wisdom needs to deliberate, may be for a few days and give a narrative which finds resonance with the people, the youth, the women, the working class, the farmers, the weaker section, Dalits, the minorities.

The people must understand that we as a party cannot be in denial but are committed to serve them. We can’t expect the Congress president to agree with all our points but we need an internal consensus at revival. We are neither dissenters nor rebels but reformists.

The question is: do we need to reflect and analyse our continuous slide? Our virtual eclipse from the large States in the country? Without a revival there, we cannot expect a national revival. From Shimla to Nagpur and beyond to Karnataka, we have barely 15 Lok Sabha seats while the BJP in this belt, alone, has 272 seats.

In the 2009 Lok Sabha elections, we had 11.92 crore votes while the BJP had about 7.80 crores. In the 2014 elections,10 crore new voters were added and BJP’s votes went up to 17.60 crore. In the 2019 elections, another 8.5 crore first voters came and the BJP added 5.5 core votes and went up to 22.94 crore voters while we crawled back to our 2009 position.

In fact, after our 2019 defeat, it was Dr. Manmohan Singh who had first suggested to appoint a committee to analyse the reasons while asking Rahul Gandhi to continue in his post.

There is a view that the letter was aimed at preventing Rahul Gandhi from taking over the reins of the party again?

This is absolutely false and I reject it. We were the ones who elected him and requested him to continue. After the 2019 elections, Rahul Gandhi had resigned and went to the extent of saying no one from the Gandhi family should become the president. The CWC didn’t agree with this view. We were in a limbo for three months and requested Sonia ji to take over. Now why this situation? Because Rahul Gandhi gave no indication, one year [of Sonia Gandhi being interim president] was ending on August 10 and there was total uncertainty.

Now, after the letter episode, do you expect an election to the top post or electing members to the CWC?

There should be, or else Congress will continue to be weak. There is no harm. Don’t take them as personal enemies if somebody contests against you. This is democracy and that’s what the Congress party always had. We should immediately go for a nation-wide membership drive and based on that membership, have Blocks, District and State leaders who should elect the new All India Congress Committee (AICC) delegates. These AICC delegates will elect the new president. We should have elected members to the CWC and so on. These are my views but it is up to the CWC that can take the final call.

There are fears that going ahead, the Congress party may split. How do you respond?

Who splits from whom? I fail to understand. I think those who were not part of building this party may talk of something like this because they don’t understand the Congress culture. We are the core and have built this party under Indira Gandhi’s leadership and Sanjay Gandhi. We have a strong sense of belonging to the Congress ideology and have co-ownership of this party. We are not tenants in this party or lateral entrants. We are the Congress!

The CWC had asked for an end to this debate but some of you continue to speak out. Is this not defiance?

No. We are a democratic party. The letter was neither made public nor circulated in the CWC. There was deliberate disinformation by certain sections which created a lot of anger and anxieties among Congressmen. It had become absolutely essential to reassure our comrades.