85th Plenary Session of Congress Apart from the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, the strategy was also outlined in the meeting held in Raipur, Chhattisgarh. Strengthening the authority of Mallikarjun Kharge as the elected president of the party, Apart from a clear expression of his willingness to work with like-minded secular parties, Congress resolves to pursue a swift social justice agenda, a paradigm shift for a party. While the party has always had a welfare agenda, it failed to accommodate the political aspirations of the subalterns, who found other parties more suitable. The party adopted a separate resolution on social justice, and a dedicated ministry for the empowerment of Other Backward Classes (OBCs), creation of a National Council for Social Justice, publication of an annual “Status of Social Justice” report along the lines of promised to do National Economic Survey, Reservation in the higher judiciary for Scheduled Castes (SC), Scheduled Tribes (ST) and OBCs and the Rohith Vemula Act for students from disadvantaged sections if elected to power. After losing out to regional parties in the post-Mandal era, the party is now aiming to win over the subalterns. Therefore, as a start, it amended its own constitution to reserve half the seats in the Congress Working Committee for Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, Other Backward Classes, women and minorities. The party’s sacrosanct declarations at the Udaipur Chintan Shivir last year were abandoned almost immediately, and the Raipur resolutions will be seen to follow suit in the coming months.
The party has promised “Total Social Security”, a social security framework that would have legal guarantees of a minimum income and social security for the poor. It also promises a universal basket of rights for all Indians, namely the right to a basic income through the Minimum Income Scheme (NYAY), the right to health, pensions for single women, the elderly and persons with disabilities, a comprehensive integrated child development National Food Security Act in line with the plan, and quality elementary schooling and maternity rights. A new welfare framework is being debated around the world to reduce rising inequalities and other challenges such as unemployment and underemployment, and the Congress’s views should spur a new, informed debate in India. Though the party touted NYAY or a universal income scheme before the 2019 general election, it did not garner any electoral gains. The party now hopes that the promise of a better future with assured income, which also accounts for social identity, can counter the Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) Hindutva Plus. Recognizing the fact that inequality is not just physical, and discrimination is not just on religious grounds, the Congress has taken the debate beyond the secular-communal binary that has worked to the BJP’s advantage in recent years. For this strategy to succeed, the Congress will have to shed its characteristic cowardice and build a strong political campaign aligned with its new thinking.