We hear often enough about the parivar or the extended family of the Bharatiya Janata Party, especially when someone attached to a group that gets any sort of patronage from the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh or Vishwa Hindu Parishad decides to say something silly. The Congress doesn't get talked about in those terms, primarily because the larger constellation of organisations directly attached to them – which don't otherwise come under "civil society" – don't have nearly as much cultural import or influence. But that doesn't mean there isn't a Congress parivar or that it isn't silly.
The reactions of some of these organisations to events in the last few days alone serve as proof of how ridiculous this set of organisations are.
Take the WithCongress twitter handle, which claims to be the "biggest online representative of volunteers" of the Indian National Congress. The handle includes a steady stream of angry partisan propaganda, as might be expected, with the occasional retweeted toilet humour about Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The handle was briefly in the news last week when former Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah called it out for resorting to petty criticism of Modi's speech to the UK Parliament, the first by an Indian Prime Minister.
The Congress and its larger support base seems to have embraced its opponent's strategy of presuming they are always right, everyone else is always wrong and that they need to attack the prime minister no matter what he does. So Modi gives a speech at the Royal Court in British Parliament? Take to twitter to insist it wasn't a joint session (because Parliament wasn't in session).
The Congress' overseas unit took this a step further, somehow managing to characterise all of foreign policy as an international attempt to interfere with the policies of India.
"For foreign nationals, who either have a communal bias or are ignorant about India, to fete Modi when the communal situation in India is highly disturbing and clearly the mood of the country has turned against him, would be an insult to the people of the country," the Indian Overseas Congress (London) stated in a letter to the Europe India Forum, organisers of the Wembley event featuring Modi and UK Prime Minister David Cameron, according to IANS.
That's right, the Overseas Congress is suggesting here that having a foreign government even interact with the Prime Minister of India is the equivalent of interference in internal affairs. The foreign hand has always been the Congress' favoured punching bag, but this is taking it a bit far.
Closer to home, is the National Students Union of India, which seems to have learnt no lessons from the Lok Sabha elections of 2014. Back then, a remark by former union minister Mani Shankar Aiyar about Modi's chaiwalla origins gave the BJP a talking point that further confirmed the image of the Congress as being elitist.
On Sunday, the Times of India reported that the NSUI had put up a poster in Allahabad with a remark that did pretty much the same thing, adding in a caste element too.
The poster features pictures of both India's first prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru as well as Modi, with the inscription saying, "kahaan raj bhoj, kahaan gangu." Although the direct reference is to a North Indian proverb, about the difference in stature between a king and a commoner, the complete phrase is 'gangu teli,' which could easily be seen as a reference to Modi's caste.
Unlike with the larger Sangh Parivar, this silliness from Congress affiliated organisations rarely gets as much play as the equivalent on the other side, such as when a BJP member threatens to cut the head off a politician. Those on the Right would like to see this as a nefarious plot to play up their fringe elements. A more sober view might be that this is simply an acknowledgement of the Congress High Command culture, where low-level elements simply do not have much of an influence beyond their immediate vicinity.
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The reactions of some of these organisations to events in the last few days alone serve as proof of how ridiculous this set of organisations are.
Take the WithCongress twitter handle, which claims to be the "biggest online representative of volunteers" of the Indian National Congress. The handle includes a steady stream of angry partisan propaganda, as might be expected, with the occasional retweeted toilet humour about Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The handle was briefly in the news last week when former Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah called it out for resorting to petty criticism of Modi's speech to the UK Parliament, the first by an Indian Prime Minister.
The Indian PM made an excellent speech to British MPs in their Parliament. Why can't we just take pride in that???? https://t.co/O6Nt1ZlaUJ
— Omar Abdullah (@abdullah_omar) November 13, 2015The Congress and its larger support base seems to have embraced its opponent's strategy of presuming they are always right, everyone else is always wrong and that they need to attack the prime minister no matter what he does. So Modi gives a speech at the Royal Court in British Parliament? Take to twitter to insist it wasn't a joint session (because Parliament wasn't in session).
The Congress' overseas unit took this a step further, somehow managing to characterise all of foreign policy as an international attempt to interfere with the policies of India.
"For foreign nationals, who either have a communal bias or are ignorant about India, to fete Modi when the communal situation in India is highly disturbing and clearly the mood of the country has turned against him, would be an insult to the people of the country," the Indian Overseas Congress (London) stated in a letter to the Europe India Forum, organisers of the Wembley event featuring Modi and UK Prime Minister David Cameron, according to IANS.
"It would also be an unacceptable attempt to influence Indians from abroad and consequently an interference in the internal affairs of India."
That's right, the Overseas Congress is suggesting here that having a foreign government even interact with the Prime Minister of India is the equivalent of interference in internal affairs. The foreign hand has always been the Congress' favoured punching bag, but this is taking it a bit far.
Closer to home, is the National Students Union of India, which seems to have learnt no lessons from the Lok Sabha elections of 2014. Back then, a remark by former union minister Mani Shankar Aiyar about Modi's chaiwalla origins gave the BJP a talking point that further confirmed the image of the Congress as being elitist.
On Sunday, the Times of India reported that the NSUI had put up a poster in Allahabad with a remark that did pretty much the same thing, adding in a caste element too.
The poster features pictures of both India's first prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru as well as Modi, with the inscription saying, "kahaan raj bhoj, kahaan gangu." Although the direct reference is to a North Indian proverb, about the difference in stature between a king and a commoner, the complete phrase is 'gangu teli,' which could easily be seen as a reference to Modi's caste.
Unlike with the larger Sangh Parivar, this silliness from Congress affiliated organisations rarely gets as much play as the equivalent on the other side, such as when a BJP member threatens to cut the head off a politician. Those on the Right would like to see this as a nefarious plot to play up their fringe elements. A more sober view might be that this is simply an acknowledgement of the Congress High Command culture, where low-level elements simply do not have much of an influence beyond their immediate vicinity.