To Defeat BJP, Congress Needs to Outwork Not Outshout Ruling Party
There is considerable merit in what Union Home Minister Amit Shah said recently about the electoral setbacks faced by the Opposition, especially the Congress, since the 2024 Lok Sabha polls. Speaking during the debate on election reforms, Shah argued that the Congress’s defeats were rooted not in vote irregularities but in leadership failures and organisational weakness. Instead of introspection, he said, the party was “deflecting blame by peddling a false narrative of vote theft.”
Shah’s comments, of course, cannot be read as a blanket denial of malpractice in elections. Indian elections, conducted across a vast and diverse country, are not immune to violations, ranging from voter deletions to booth-level irregularities. However, there is a compelling truth in the charge that the Congress today lacks the organisational muscle needed to counter such practices on the ground. A party that once prided itself on an extensive booth-level presence today struggles to even deploy representatives during critical electoral processes.
A stark example of this organisational erosion surfaced recently during the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in Uttar Pradesh. According to newspaper reports, the Congress failed to appoint Booth Level Agents (BLAs) in at least 17 districts. This is not a small oversight, it is a fundamental collapse of the party’s electoral machinery in India’s largest state. Uttar Pradesh has 1.62 lakh polling booths. According to data from the Chief Electoral Officer, the BJP had 1.6 lakh BLAs as on November 28, covering 98.37% of booths; the Samajwadi Party had 1.42 lakh (87.46%); and the BSP had 1.38 lakh (85%). The Congress, by contrast, had just 49,121 BLAs, barely 30.23% of booths.
The role of a BLA is too critical to be treated casually. Working directly with the Election Commission’s Booth Level Officer, the agent is responsible for verifying voter data, reporting discrepancies, and ensuring that the party’s voter base is not inadvertently or deliberately struck off the rolls. Every serious political party treats the SIR process with urgency because the integrity of the voter list directly affects electoral outcomes. That the Congress failed to field BLAs even in districts where it historically retains some presence, such as Saharanpur and Sultanpur, speaks volumes about how hollow its once-formidable grassroots organisation has become.
The decline in organisational strength is not a new story for the Congress. It has been unfolding over decades, shaped by centralised leadership, dependency on charismatic faces, and absence of meaningful engagement with local workers. But in the current environment, where elections are fought booth by booth, WhatsApp group by WhatsApp group, and beneficiary list by beneficiary list, this weakness is not merely a handicap but a question of survival.
If the Congress is serious about reclaiming relevance, it must recognise that its primary political battle is not in television studios or at high-decibel press conferences. It lies in the lanes of villages, mohallas of towns, and urban wards where the BJP’s organisational apparatus is deeply entrenched. The BJP’s strength today stems as much from its ideological coherence as from its extraordinarily disciplined cadre network, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh volunteers, BJP workers, page-level workers, social media nodes, and a robust system of information gathering and dissemination.
The Congress, instead of matching this machinery, continues to rely heavily on national leaders to articulate dissent against the government. But politics today is not driven solely by headline-making speeches; it is driven by consistent engagement with citizens and by visibility at the micro level. People may hear leaders in Delhi, but they vote based on their interactions with workers in their own neighbourhoods.
The Congress must, therefore, reclaim the fundamentals of political organisation. First, a comprehensive cadre-rebuilding programme is essential. This requires more than recruiting workers; it requires training them. The Congress needs to revive its tradition of political education, sessions that once shaped generations of party workers with clarity on ideology, constitutional values, welfare policies, and local issues. The BJP has mastered this, whereas the Congress has abandoned it.
Next the Congress must shift towards programme-based mobilisation, not merely event-based mobilisation. Its public programmes, whether padyatras, social campaigns, or outreach initiatives, should not be limited to symbolic gestures. They must be structured around door-to-door communication, grievance redressal camps, membership drives, and volunteer engagement.
The BJP’s ‘micro-targeting’ strategy has been successful because it pairs political messaging with tangible benefits or issue-based interventions. The Congress must adopt a similar approach with its own ideological framework and welfare commitments.
Technology must become a backbone, not an afterthought. The BJP’s mastery of digital communication ensures that every booth receives tailored messaging. The Congress often appears digital-savvy only during national campaigns, but its technological presence collapses at the ward level. A revitalised Congress must deploy digital tools to track voters, coordinate workers, and maintain two-way communication with supporters.
Finally, and most importantly, the party must create an environment where ordinary people feel welcome, valued, and empowered. A political party survives by being present in people’s daily concerns like rising prices, unemployment, local infrastructure, and welfare delivery. When people see party workers walking the streets, helping with documents, solving local problems, and listening sincerely, they participate. When they participate, they feel ownership. And when they feel ownership, they vote.
The Congress will not defeat the BJP by outshouting it in Parliament. It can only do so by outworking it at the grassroots. Electoral politics is ultimately a ground game. Strengthening cadres, rebuilding connections with communities, and reviving a culture of participation is indispensable.
If the Congress wishes to challenge the BJP’s dominance, the road does not run through fiery speeches in New Delhi. It runs through the smallest booth in the smallest village in the smallest district. Revival, if it comes, will come from below.
(Sidharth Mishra is an author, academician and president of the Centre for Reforms, Development & Justice)
