After a while, Trivedi conveyed the leadership’s stand that the camp, in which attendance was mandatory, would not be deferred. Many saw it as “autocratic”, particularly coming from someone “who does not even hold any official post” in the NSUI or the party. Trivedi quit the group.
The camp was eventually cancelled as Sachin Rao, the AICC in-charge of training, had to be in Jammu and Kashmir around that time.
In many ways, the pushback over a schedule issue serves as an index of the larger stirrings that the “lateral entry” of faces with a Left background, like Kanhaiya, Mevani and Trivedi, have sparked within the Congress.
Kanhaiya, who rose to prominence after being arrested in a sedition case while serving as the president of the JNU Students’ Union, was a member of the Communist Party of India (CPI). Trivedi, Kumar’s comrade from the student movement, was an activist of the Students’ Federation of India (SFI)—the student wing of the Communist Party of India (Marxist)—and the Democratic Students’ Federation (DSF).
It was Rahul Gandhi who played an instrumental role in bringing in these former student leaders, with the objective of equipping the Congress with a “strong progressive, ideological core” within the next decade, said a member of Team Rahul—a collective term for leaders and functionaries close to the Rae Bareli MP.
Naturally, their rise has been rapid within the Congress. Kanhaiya, for instance, was not just made the AICC in-charge of the NSUI—a key post that is supposed to act as a bridge between the party and the student body—but also contested, and lost, the 2024 general elections from the North-East Delhi parliamentary constituency.
A crowd-puller owing to his oratory skills, he is among the party’s most prominent star campaigners and a permanent invitee to the Congress Working Committee (CWC), its highest decision-making forum.
In parallel, resentment grew against him among a section of the Congress. A growing perception that Kanhaiya was inaccessible and lacked interest in developing the organisation from the grassroots did not help his case either.
Many within the Congress, however, feel the resentment that a section of leaders harbour against Kanhaiya is symptomatic of larger structural issues that plague the party. They dismiss the notion that the pushback could be an outcome of an impression that Left activists who made lateral entries in the party hold more sway in the party than leaders who have grown up the ranks internally.
ThePrint reached Kanhaiya via calls and text messages. This report will be updated if and when a response is received.
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‘What prevents you from meeting people, taking calls?’
Kanhaiya was entrusted with the post of AICC NSUI in-charge in July 2023, two months before the high-stakes Delhi University Students Union (DUSU) polls, which were being held after three years.
The Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP), the student wing of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), won the posts of president, secretary and joint secretary, while the Congress was able to win only the vice president’s post. The results of the 2024 DUSU elections have not been announced yet.
In the JNUSU elections held in March this year—after a gap of five years—the NSUI polled only 5 percent of the total votes, compared to 13.8 percent in 2019. “While the NSUI was never strong in JNU, its vote share had improved over the years,” said a senior NSUI functionary, speaking on the condition of anonymity.
“He (Kanhaiya) hardly visited the colleges in DU after assuming charge. The few times he did visit North Campus, it was to canvas for individual candidates, not the NSUI. He hardly held meetings with the state executive bodies. The post of AICC in-charge of the NSUI is a coveted one. If he was not interested, someone else more deserving could have been given the responsibility,” he added.
Another decision, allegedly imposed by Kanhaiya, was barring NOBs from being made state presidents of the NSUI. This also triggered consternation among a section of the organisation’s office-bearers, said the NSUI leader, adding that “the NOBs passed a resolution against the decision a day after the DUSU polls” held on 27 September.
Another NSUI leader said, “Kanhaiya Kumar cannot afford to be inaccessible at this stage. Why can’t people reach him directly instead of always having to approach through his personal aides? He says in private meetings how he has the power to sack even the national president of the NSUI over underperformance. Maybe that’s his way of asserting authority. And that is needed to some extent. But what prevents you from meeting people, taking their calls? Why is he missing from protests held by NSUI? Dafli kyu gayab ho gayi ab?”
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‘Those used to old ways will have grievances’
Dismissing such criticisms of Kanhaiya, a Congress leader close to Rahul said, “It’s not an ideological dispute. These people (detractors of Kanhaiya) only use ideology instrumentally. They are not ideological. It’s the same old power struggle that has defined the Congress over generations. Ideology is just a ruse for them to go after Kanhaiya. They conjure up different narratives for targeting people like Kanhaiya or Yogendra Yadav. Rahul Gandhi brought in people like Kanhaiya in the party to ensure that a mainstream party offers progressive articulation. And he continues to do that.”
Trivedi told ThePrint that he, along with Kanhaiya, joined the party primarily because Rahul Gandhi “is the only mainstream leader who is fighting for value-based politics”.
“We are wedded to certain principles and values. Those values formed the core of our anti-colonial, nationalist movement and there is a need to revive them. And it is with that mindset that we joined the party. Rahul Gandhi wants young people who abide by those values. That’s the only reason we joined the Congress. Why else would we have done so when the party was at its lowest? We will continue to fight for those values irrespective of electoral results,” said Trivedi, who is from Madhya Pradesh.
A member of Team Rahul also emphasised that there was no deep-seated resentment against Kanhaiya in the organisation.
“The objective is clear. Rahul Gandhi’s idea behind inducting leaders like Kanhaiya is to provide a strong ideological core to the Congress within the next decade. He has given full autonomy to all those inductees. Kanhaiya is doing just that. For instance, a Dalit has been made the state president of Rajasthan NSUI. Also, why should NOBs be allowed to become state presidents? The NOBs are supposed to guide the state presidents, adjudicate disputes. Those used to the old ways of operating will naturally have grievances,” the member said.
The functionary quoted above also credited Kanhaiya with having brought about a cultural shift in the way the NSUI operates. “The national executive meetings of NSUI used to be held in holiday locations, five-star hotels and resorts. But the first national executive of the NSUI held after Kanhaiya was made its AICC in-charge was in the party’s headquarters in Delhi. It was held in the press conference room and leaders stayed put in Delhi. It was an austere affair that may not have gone down well with many,” he said.
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Controversial comments & loud silences
Meanwhile, Kanhaiya continues to grab headlines, sometimes through his utterances, and at other times through his silences. His latest remarks on Amruta Fadnavis—the wife of Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis—have sparked a controversy in poll-bound Maharashtra.
Addressing a rally in Nagpur last Wednesday, Kanhaiya took aim at the senior BJP leader over equating the ongoing elections to a dharmayudh. “Why is it that common people will fight this dharmayudh while children of leaders will study in Oxford and Cambridge? It cannot be the case that we will fight to protect dharma while the deputy CM’s wife is engaged in making Instagram reels,” Kanhaiya said.
On Friday, Fadnavis hit back at Kanhaiya over the remarks, saying the “troll army makes allegations against my wife but I told my wife that we are in politics and we have to keep patience”.
“I am not surprised by this. My wife and I have suffered for the last five years. They could not find anything against me, they deployed all the agencies against me. They investigated everything from my hair to my blood but did not find anything against me. When they did not find anything, they started personal attacks on me,” Fadnavis told ANI.
If Kanhaiya’s comments made the news this time, in 2020 it was his silence over the arrests of student activists in connection with the communal riots in Northeast Delhi. Barring a Facebook post, which came after people started questioning his muted stance on the arrests including that of Umar Khalid, Kanhaiya gradually pivoted away from the politics that he had represented initially, at least until his unsuccessful campaign as a Lok Sabha candidate for the CPI in the 2019 elections from Bihar’s Begusarai.
Five years later, a self-confessed “non-believer”, Kanhaiya, a former comrade, this time as the Congress’ Lok Sabha candidate from North-East Delhi, sat through a havan before heading out to file his nomination. The political symbolism of that act was not lost on anyone, even though he sought the blessings of religious leaders of other faiths who presented him with a framed portrait of the Constitution of India.
Kanhaiya had found himself battling criticism within a month of joining the Congress in 2021 after posting a picture of himself on Instagram shot against the backdrop of a picturesque location in the hills. He had captioned the picture with a Bashir Badr couplet: “Main Chup Raha To Aur Galat Fehmiyaan Barhi/Wo Bhi Suna Hai Usne Jo Maine Kaha Nahi“, appearing to suggest that he was acutely aware of the criticism that his silence on issues of minority rights and civil liberties was drawing.
But people close to him insist that it would be unfair to characterise him as someone who had his radical edge blunted by mainstream politics. “It was not Virender Sehwag’s nature to defend or Rahul Dravid’s to pile up runs quickly. Similarly, it is not Kanhaiya Kumar’s approach to keep his door open for small talks with those interested in factional power plays. Rahul Gandhi has set a goal for him and he is engaged in achieving that,” said a Congress leader.