as things stand sonia has not established herself as the unquestioned leader of any alliance her negotiating skills remain to be tested the congress main challenge is to have an alliance with itself secure its own base and constituency and in this her success has been at best mixed says mehtaperformanceterm test 8max marks 20is it an opposition party if it is then the party has no agenda save trying to prevent the government from accomplishing anything says mecklai an embarrassing miscalculation blew the partys chances to form the government in 1999 as the main opposition the congress has been found wanting the partys position on most issues remains unclear whats more there have been few signs of the partys ability to go in for the kill whenever opportunity presents itself joshi cites kargil and the fiasco of operation parakram in 2002 bhatt and padamsee believe she should have taken a much stronger stand on gujarat finally politics is not the art of compromise it is the courage to stand up for your principles says padamsee bhatt puts it more strongly she has let down the minority community which the congress has always professed to stand for the crux of the problem as mehta says lies in the fact that no one knows what sonias own beliefs are she is almost always reactive rather than proactive for malik the congress scores high on its consistent stand against ayodhya whenever the temple issue has raised its tenor the opposition has managed to quell the hysteria on disinvestment however there has been a lot of ambiguity does she want it or doesnt she clean politicsterm test 11max marks 20while the partys state governments have had a reasonably good record in maharashtra the government seems to skate on thin ice in punjab promoting bhattal as deputy chief minister despite corruption charges does not set a good example says joshi ajit jogi and the stamp paper scam take away a lot of her marks says bhatt in this department malik believes both parties must share the honours equally while tehelka judeo etc have been recent nightmares for the ndabjp longstanding issues like bofors and now jogi have haunted the congress no less interestingly this is the only subject where sonia scores higher than her rival why because its easy to be clean when you dont have power however if she does come to power sonia will need to promise the people that she will sack all her corrupt party members only then can she begin on a clean slate says padamsee personally she has by and large maintained a clean record like vajpayee who has remained unscathed despite the sundry tehelkascommentright now sonia gandhi appears brittle and not quite ready to assume the top office this week she seemed to be making up for lost time too little too late only time will tell but no one should underestimate the congress wide appeal across the country if the congress must win it would