Lack of electoral success cannot keep them from plum political portfolios. Talent is certainly not the only force that hurries them to prominence in their non-political businesses. They are touched by The Family and, for those who still haven’t noticed, they’re back in power. First, the Cabinet was packed with Friends of The Family — the same stale mix of friends, loyalists and sycophants, long past their best-before date. Now, as a report in this paper reminds us, the culture-troopers are trickling back in as well, to reclaim their positions at the pinnacles of soft power. The chosen fashionistas, interior designers, publishers, are going to be hard at work, piecing back together a forlorn national aesthetic that languished in the Gandhis’ long years out of power.Every regime has its own tight clubs with closed memberships. But the Congress in India is something of a special case. This is a party with a family — or should that be, a family with a party. Proximity to the Nehru-Gandhis has always been the required condition to rise in the party. It is necessary to qualify for state patronage when the party is in power. The problem is not just that this has not worked for democracy — it violates its basic principles of openness and accountability. It hasn’t even worked for the Congress. Most of the problems that beset the party, currently suppressed by the overlay of power, have to do with the mass movement becoming a closed shop and a grand zamindari. The party shrank as its leadership withdrew behind accumulating layers of friends and sycophants. The High Command locked itself into echo chambers even as, outside, India changed at a hectic pace.India, today, is young and impatient, fiercely competitive and less willing to make concessions to the past. In the age of restructuring and reform, there is a premium on fresh ideas and irreverence. In this stint in power, the Congress is likely to face a challenge it has arguably not faced before: how long, before the force of the times compels the party to recast itself in less feudal ways?
