Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Friday stated that the central government of India has shut down all routes of feedback and that the institutions that are supposed to support a fair political fight do not do so anymore.
During a virtual conversation with Nicholas Burns, the former US undersecretary of state for political affairs and Harvard Kennedy School Professor, Gandhi spoke about the ongoing farmers' protest.
Premium He said that the agrarians have no other way except to come out on the streets because the government has not given space for dialogue.
"It is absolutely necessary to reform agriculture, but you cannot attack the foundation of the agriculture system and you certainly cannot do that without having a conversation, because they are going to react," he said while referring to the three contentious agri laws.
Gandhi went on to speak about the ongoing assembly elections and political campaigning.
He said that there is a need for institutional structures, protection by the judicial system, reasonably free media, financial parity and a set of institutional structures that allow his party to operate as a political party, but all of this is not there.
"In Assam, the gentleman who is running our campaign (for the Assembly polls) has been sending me videos of BJP candidates running around with voting machines in their cars.
"He is screaming at the top of his voice saying look, I have got a really serious problem here, but there is nothing going on in the national media," the former Congress chief said.
Premium Premium He stated that not just Congress but other parties like the Bahujan Samaj Party, the Samajwadi Party and the Nationalist Congress Party are also not winning elections in India.
The Congress MP alleged that the reason was "wholesale capture of the country's institutional framework" and "an absolute financial and media dominance by the BJP."
"To fight elections, I need institutional structures, I need a judicial system that protects me, I need a media that is reasonably free, I need financial parity, I need a set of institutional structures that allow me to operate as a political party. I do not have them," Gandhi said.
He said the way the BJP is behaving, a lot of people are getting discontented very fast and there is a need to bring them together.
"We are no longer in the same paradigm we were before 2014, we are in a different paradigm. We are in a paradigm where the institutions that are supposed to protect us do not protect us anymore," the Congress leader said.
The institutions that are supposed to support a fair political fight do not do so anymore, he alleged.
Noting that India is essentially a "negotiation", Gandhi said the country's institutional framework basically allows it to manage that negotiation, but that framework is under attack.
"So I worry that the negotiation will break down and if the negotiation breaks down in a country like India, then we are in very serious trouble," he said, adding that this gives the Congress a big opportunity and thus, "we have to redefine ourselves".
Asked what would be his priority if he was the prime minister, he said he would move from a growth-centric idea to a job-centric idea of the economy.
The only way to start the economy now is to jumpstart production and put a huge amount of money in the hands of people, he added.
The former Congress chief noted that the growth of the economy is meaningless if it does not create enough jobs and that jobs creation and value addition need to be put on a "mission mode" in the country in the next few years.
With inputs from agencies.
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