The Congress Party has been in power for the maximum period, for around 58years of 65years of Indian independence. Any party could not have stayed in power for such a long times and keep getting elected repeatedly is no small achievement. This achievement cannot be wholly attributed to the Congress party, because most of the times the opposition camp was divided, but when the opposition were united, Congress did face defeats in the elections. What has the Congress did that made the voters still have faith in the party, even though there are many corruption charges, misgovernance etc.
One reason is the poor education of the maximum population. Education is not text book education, but also the electrol education. The Congress has used the names of Gandhi-Nehru and projected thier personalities and principles as the guiding force of the party, and thus fooled the electorate for a long times. With times, the electroal education of the people have improved, and with emergence of strong regional parties, this magic of Congress has been fading, still Congress on any given day is the most powerful political party in the nation. BJP is only catching up with the congress, but it is a still way behind. Only if the circumstances are all favorable, then only BJP can come to power. It can also due to people's loss of faith in Congress and not people's live for BJP. If recent opinions show that BJP is gaining far more acceptance among the voters, which is a good sign for the party.
Whenever the Congress is in power, there is political stability, which means the party has always completed its full term by hook or crook. This was not possible for the BJP which could not provide the stability twice in quick succession, but quickly learnt the games of politics and finally lasted its full term. The political stability which the Congress can provide either at the state level or at national level has been its USP. The party machinery can work overtime to get the majority support for a number of issues. But the issues themselves can be a recipe for nation disaster, but the Congress can get support.
At the end of the terms, the Party usually comes with such a populist measures, people will stay in awe till the elections get over, only to realize that they have been fooled again. The last term budget of the Congress party or any other party will be full of goodies, which makes the common man pardon the sins of the previous years. Thus any party get elected once and know what kind of goodies to provide can come back to power again and again. Unless the party is hit by big corruption scandals like of Bofors which effect the national sentiment other scams will be pardoned by the voter.
The congress has done not many great things for the minorities and particularly muslims, but some few good things like increasing reservations, providing special budgetory allocations, etc to create vote blocs. The blocs of people have benefited not to great extent due to the policies, but the voters have been voting as a bloc to the congress. Congress can claim to be the sole responsible party to make the minorities to become united in thier exertion of pressure on the government on various issues relating thier self interests. BJP also tried to make Hindu bloc to get maximum votes, but the secular hindus didnot feel it good for the national interest, thus the BJP failed where congress succeded.
Congress has made sure that the average citizen will always reminded about the great works of the Congress leaders by naming many governmental properties after its leaders. Apart from this, the reward system in the party is very clear from the beginning. Those who are in favour of the family will be rewarded generously and those who revolt are either thrown out of the party or cut to size. The high command culture of the party has lead to a highly disciplined and slave type mentality in the ranks and there are rarely any dissent which is publicly expressed. The entire party sings almost the same tune thus providing clarity to the nation. But this type of singing in the current day scenario doesnot work and Congress has to change its ways for its own interests.
Blackmoney that has been hoarded is bought back for election campaign, buying of voters, distribution of money to campaign audience etc, will improve the domestic spending and boosts the economy. Year after year the cost of election is increasing exponentially. EC has been doing tremendous work to curb the flow of excess money and has put in accounting practices to check the election expenses. As the flow of money is so huge and in so many creative ways that still more work has to be done by Ec and many others.
The best thing that Congress claims to have done is the bringing of the RTI law, but it is the requirement of the membership of UN for bringing transperancy in the governmental practices. Being a member of UN it is mandatory to give people all the data that is requried by the public except documents of national security. But still many documents are awaiting to be released which BJP even during its tenure could not achieve with nothing lose. This amazes that control of Congress on even the oppositon parties also.
Rest all things that Congress claims to have done are its duties as a elected government towards its voters. Any government would have done more or less the same things if in power, and is amply visible by the details of the performance of various state on a number of factors. This brings to conclusion that the current Congress Government or its previous versions have nothing to claim of significance except its long period for being in power. The problem of corruption being faced by this government is huge in numbers, but in comparision GDP is still minuscule and will not matter in elections. The magic of Bijli, Sadak, Pani, youth, jobs etc will still rule the election campaigns.
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