The time to rally behind Rahul Gandhi

• The report argues that opposition unity requires rallying around Rahul Gandhi and the Congress, which it describes as the only opposition force with a nationwide organisation and parliamentary presence

• It highlights the role and sacrifices of grassroots Congress and Youth Congress workers, arguing that their long-term organisational work should not be overshadowed by newer social-media activists

• The report calls for opposition consolidation, saying public anger must be converted into grassroots organisation and electoral participation to challenge the Modi government

There comes a point in every political struggle when those who claim to be fighting the same battle must decide whether they want to strengthen the fight or create another centre of it.

India is at such a moment.

For more than a decade, Rahul Gandhi and the Congress have remained at the forefront of the political fight against the Narendra Modi government. Through Parliament, public meetings, yatras, protests and direct engagement with people, Rahul Gandhi has consistently raised questions about unemployment, economic inequality, farmers, institutional accountability, social justice and the concentration of economic power.

Many of the issues being discussed widely today were raised by Rahul Gandhi and Congress workers long before they became popular subjects on social media.

Whether it was his warnings about the consequences of the pandemic, his criticism of the state of the economy, his focus on unemployment and the concentration of wealth, or his concerns about particular government policies, Rahul Gandhi has repeatedly tried to bring these issues before the country. He has also travelled personally to places where people were affected, rather than limiting his politics to Parliament or television studios.

That persistence matters.

It is now time for those who genuinely want to challenge the Narendra Modi–Amit Shah political establishment to recognise that the opposition cannot afford endless fragmentation. It needs to rally behind the leadership and organisation that already exist.

That leadership is Rahul Gandhi. That organisation is the Indian National Congress.

This is not simply about an individual leader. Rahul Gandhi is the Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha, but his political importance goes beyond his parliamentary position. For years, he has remained one of the few national opposition leaders consistently willing to confront the government directly and take political issues to the streets. The Congress, meanwhile, has a presence across the country that no newly created social-media movement can reproduce overnight.

The Indian Youth Congress is an important part of that story.

Thousands of its workers have spent years protesting, organising, travelling to districts, facing detention and police action, and building political networks without cameras following them. Their work rarely becomes a viral video. Yet this organisational labour creates the political infrastructure necessary for a sustained opposition.

Consider the protests around the India-US trade negotiations. Farmers’ organisations raised concerns about the possible consequences for Indian agriculture and rural livelihoods. The Indian Youth Congress also took the issue to the streets, with workers detained during demonstrations in Delhi. In February 2026, IYC workers protested at the AI Impact Summit over the trade deal and unemployment; several were arrested, and IYC president Uday Bhanu Chib was subsequently taken into police custody in connection with the case.

The point is not whether every tactic used during those protests should be defended. The point is that Congress and Youth Congress workers were willing to take political risks to raise issues they believed affected farmers, young people and the country’s economic interests.

These workers should not become invisible simply because another activist later receives more attention on Instagram or Facebook.

India is seeing a new generation of activists emerge. That is welcome. Young people coming onto the streets, questioning authority and demanding accountability is essential to a democracy.

But political memory must be longer than a social-media cycle.

We have to ask who was protesting before the cameras arrived, who remained on the streets after the cameras left, and who continued organising when there was no guarantee of applause.

The story of Youth Congress worker Prabhat Pandey should also remain part of this memory. Pandey died in December 2024 on a day when Congress workers were protesting in Lucknow. The circumstances surrounding his death became the subject of competing claims and a police investigation.

Whatever conclusions are ultimately drawn from that case, Prabhat was a young political worker participating in a Congress protest. His story represents thousands of ordinary workers whose political sacrifices rarely receive the attention given to prominent faces.

This is the difference between political visibility and political organisation.

An activist may have millions of followers and still have no political organisation in a constituency. A Congress worker may have hardly any followers and yet know hundreds of families in a village, block or district. One produces digital visibility; the other can build lasting political participation.

India needs both, but the opposition cannot win a national political battle without organisation.

The BJP understands this very well. Its strength has never rested only on its social-media presence. It has built a vast organisational structure capable of carrying its political message from national leadership to the booth.

If the objective is to challenge that structure electorally, the answer cannot be to create a new opposition ecosystem every time a new activist becomes prominent.

The answer has to be consolidation.

Those who genuinely believe that the country needs an alternative to the present government should ask a straightforward question: why create another political centre when there is already a national party with a parliamentary presence, a nationwide organisational network and decades of experience in electoral politics?

Independent activists have a role. Civil society has a role. Regional parties have a role. Students, farmers, lawyers, journalists and citizens’ movements all have their own place in a democracy.

But when the objective is to change the government through elections, organisation matters.

And the Congress has that organisation.

This is also why the current moment demands greater recognition of Rahul Gandhi’s leadership. He has spent years trying to bring disparate public concerns into a larger political narrative. His Bharat Jodo Yatra was not merely a political roadshow; it was an attempt to physically reconnect the national opposition leadership with citizens across large parts of the country. His subsequent interventions have continued to focus on young people, employment, economic opportunity, representation and institutional accountability.

The Congress must renew itself. It must give greater space to young leaders, strengthen its organisation and learn from its electoral setbacks. But organisational renewal should strengthen the Congress, not become an argument for abandoning it.

The young people who have been fighting on the streets for years should not be asked to step aside because newer faces have suddenly become popular. Their experience and energy should instead help build a larger generation of political activists.

India’s young people deserve an economy where opportunity is not perceived to be concentrated in the hands of a few powerful business groups. Farmers deserve policies that protect their livelihoods. Marginalised communities deserve meaningful representation. Citizens deserve institutions they can trust. Democracy requires an opposition capable of challenging the government both inside Parliament and outside it.

None of this can be achieved through hashtags alone.

The real challenge is to convert public anger into political organisation, political organisation into electoral participation and electoral participation into a government that can be held accountable.

That requires a political vehicle.

For those who want to challenge the Narendra Modi government, the time has come to recognise that building parallel spaces will only divide energy that needs to be concentrated. The Congress already exists. Rahul Gandhi already occupies the national opposition space.

What is required now is not another opposition.

It is a stronger opposition.

We should celebrate the new activists bringing people onto the streets. But we must also remember the Congress workers who created the political space in which today’s activism is possible.

We should remember those who protested without cameras, spent nights in police stations, travelled across districts, built organisations and continued fighting when the political climate was hostile.

Movements are not created overnight. They are built by thousands of people whose names never trend.

The opposition now has a choice: continue creating separate centres of political attention, or bring those energies together around an organisation capable of fighting nationally.

For those who believe that India needs political change, this is the time to rally behind Rahul Gandhi, strengthen the Congress and recognise the workers who have carried this struggle for years.

The country does not need more fragmented opposition.

It needs a united political force capable of taking the fight all the way—from the street to Parliament, and ultimately to the ballot box.

Mudassir Shams is vice-president, Youth Congress, Bihar