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Reclaiming the traditional base

The aam admi has restaked his claim to the Congress' affections, judging from the explosion of activity in party offices geared to addressing the problems of the common people — galloping prices, inadequate stocks in the public distribution system, and continuing farmer suicides. If three high-level party meetings within a week underscored Congress President Sonia Gandhi's anxiety on the inflation front, the Prime Minister, for his part, forayed into chronically distressed Vidarbha, bringing the first glimmer of hope to a region unfamiliar with VIP angst, and long resigned to living with its droughts and suicides. In each of her meetings — with the party's Working Committee, general secretaries and Chief Ministers — the Congress chief conveyed but one message: spare no effort to alleviate the sufferings of the poor. For Congresspersons, basking in the warmth of office after eight years in the wilderness, the cannonball from Ms. Gandhi came as a much-needed reality check, a stern reminder that the aam admi was the party's only match winner. It was fitting that the Congress chief should have been the one to do the tough talking. The election year of 2004 saw her criss-crossing the country, connecting with the distressed and the poor even as an overconfident Vajpayee regime brazenly appealed to the upper crust. Against the glitter of the `India shining' campaign, the Congress emphasis on the aam admi appeared anachronistic, unimaginative.

In the event, election 2004 was the revenge of the aam admi. The verdict taught a lesson to the political class as a whole: that while the privileged had the voice, the voiceless had the vote. The National Common Minimum Programme, drawn up by the constituents of the United Progressive Alliance and supported by the Left, was a product of this understanding. The preamble explicitly set out the political philosophy of the new dispensation: "The people of India have voted decisively ... for secular, progressive forces, for parties wedded to the welfare of farmers, agricultural labour, weavers, workers and weaker sections of society, for parties irrevocably committed to the daily well being of the common man across the country." The euphoria of the surprise victory over, the NCMP took the backseat to an official vision grounded in economic reform and bold foreign policy initiatives. On the positive side, the National Advisory Council, headed by Ms. Gandhi, pulled off two grand social sector achievements — the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act and the Right to Information Act. Today with Ms. Gandhi no longer in the chair, the programmes look orphaned — and more so in the absence of two stalwart members, Jean Dreze and Aruna Roy. Ms. Roy's farewell letter to the Prime Minister said all there was to say: "In the current euphoria about the performance of the economy there is a great danger of not paying heed to the anguish of the poor and the marginalised." Will the Government and party heed the warning?

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