A tall order for Gaurav Gogoi: Rebuilding Congress in BJP-dominated Assam
With internal factionalism, past electoral defeats and BJP's stronghold, Gogoi faces a formidable challenge in uniting the Congress party and forging opposition alliances.
After months long speculation, the Congress high command on Monday finally announced the appointment of Gaurav Gogoi as the new president of the Assam Pradesh Congress Committee (APCC). Gogoi, a three-time Lok Sabha member, is expected to lead the grand old party's efforts to dislodge the incumbent BJP-led NDA government in the State in the 2026 Assembly polls.
For the Congress party, which has seen its fortunes go downhill in Assam in recent years, the latest move to appoint Gogoi as the State unit president could very well be termed as a desperate effort to revive its prospects. The Congress dominated the political landscape of Assam for many decades post-Independence. However, those days now seem like a distant past.
Since 2014, the grand old party has suffered a series of setbacks in the State. The BJP's emergence as a major political force in Assam in 2014 changed the narrative dramatically.
The Congress performed poorly in the 2014, 2019, and 2024 Lok Sabha polls in the State, and also failed to impress in the 2016 and 2021 Assembly polls. Successive presidents of the APCC, including Ripun Bora and Bhupen Borah, were unable to revive the fortunes of the Congress. The party's lacklustre performance continued in the recent Panchayat elections, too, where it could not even manage to field candidates in many seats.
The next few months are going to be very challenging ones for the new APCC president. While Gogoi's performance in Parliament has been impressive over the years, State politics is a totally different ball game. The Congress in Assam is riven by factionalism and there are several leaders in the party's State unit seeking to exert their own influence.
Gogoi's first task should be to bring together all the Congress leaders and workers and iron out the differences. Secondly, he needs to seriously think about arriving at a formal seat-sharing arrangement with the other opposition parties for the 2026 Assembly elections. The Congress party may not be able to take on the NDA in the polls on its own. But, for any adjustment or alliance to fructify, compromises have to be made, by the Congress as well as the other opposition parties.
And, most importantly, Gogoi has to understand that the BJP has a very strong electoral machinery across the country. Unlike the Congress, there is no internal feud over leadership in the Assam BJP. Besides, Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma is considered a brilliant strategist. The 2026 Assembly elections could well prove to be a 'direct contest' between Himanta Biswa Sarma and Gaurav Gogoi, and the sooner Gogoi gets his grip on things the better for him and the Congress party.