Mar 23, 2026 14:42 pm IST

Opinion | 'Humiliation', 'Neglect': Congress's Quiet Unravelling As Leader After Leader Leaves

Since 2014, there have been 150 leaders of significance who have left the Grand Old Party. It indicates two vital flaws.

Rasheed Kidwai Rasheed Kidwai

Ahead of the April 9 Assembly elections, the Congress party received a severe jolt in Assam when Pradyut Bordoloi, its veteran leader and incumbent Member of Parliament from Nagaon, resigned from the party. Later, Bordoloi told the media that he was leaving after three decades with the Congress because he was feeling humiliated and isolated, insinuating that all was not well between him and Pradesh Congress Committee (PCC) president Gaurav Gogoi.

Bordoloi described how the party renominated an MLA who orchestrated an attack on him during the Panchayat elections in April 2025, but emphasised that his decision to quit was driven more by the humiliation and neglect he faced in the Congress than by ticket distribution or political opportunism.

Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma, who switched to the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) from the Congress in 2015, citing similar reasons, lost no time in welcoming Bordoloi into the BJP. "The Assam Pradesh BJP will recommend to the central leadership that he (Bordoloi) should fight the Assembly elections. There is no reason for someone with self-respect to stay with the Congress party. We aim to bring more Congress leaders into the party," Sarma said.

Not Just A Bordoloi Story

While the renomination of a tainted MLA may have triggered Bordoloi's resignation, discontent inside the Assam Congress has been hurting the party for the past several months. "When we inform Delhi of problems we face at the ground level, we get no response. They do not even respond to our emails," a Congress worker from Assam says. During conversations with state-level Congress leaders, words like '[lack of] self-respect', 'isolation', 'sidelined', and 'ignored' come up frequently.

This undercurrent, left unaddressed, has resulted in significant resignations. In May 2025, PCC spokesperson........

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