THE POLITICAL SOUL-SEARCHING
Uttar Pradesh is his battlefield of political
soul-searching. Apart from being the family legacy of the political history of
the Nehru-Gandhi family, this most populous but economically backward state is
also the state with the highest representation in the Indian Parliament.
Bhartiya Janta Party (BJP) being on the margins, Rahul’s
main opposition here is Mulayam Singh Yadav’s Samajwadi Party (SP) and
Mayawati’s Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP). Rahul had to search and claim his
political ground away from these two political outfits.
But, ironically, these two political outfits, owing to
their selfish agenda, have been instrumental in saving the UPA government at
many occasions, be it the No-Confidence Motion of 2008 or the Lokpal debate
last year or the recent discussion and voting on the retail FDI.
You are targeting Mulayam and Mayawati in Uttar Pradesh while
your party is doing backdoor dealings with them – saying something and doing
contrary to it - it has become the norm with the Indian politicians of the day –
but it was not certainly expected from the politician in Rahul Gandhi.
The ‘politician with a difference’ should have never done
it. Rahul criticizes SP government for U-turn on computer education. Rahul
blames Mayawati for miserable situation of Dalits. And his party led central
government acts with their active support. A major chunk of Rahul’s ‘pro-Dalit’
sentiment is based on anti-Mayawati politics. Yet Mayawati has become the
ultimate in-thing for the UPA government these days after she voted for the
government in the Rajya Sabha on retail FDI while Mulayam is hell-bent on killing the
‘Promotion Quota Bill’.
Yes, it is politics of compulsion and doing such
compromises have hurt chances of Rahul. His grand old party has been engaged in
unethical political business believing in the new-found dictum (of old origin)
that there is nothing unethical in politics (politicians proudly say there is
no permanent friend or foe in politics) and Rahul has seldom looked to react on
such practices.
It is true he cannot do these things publicly but given
the clout he has in the Congress party, he could have certainly brought
positive changes to its functioning. That
would be visible certainly. But the
congress party is still the same party blamed so-often for being anti-democratic. In
fact, Rahul now looks settled to promote the grand old way of functioning of
the grand old party of India
Rahul’s political career is too short and the name of the
‘Gandhi family’ is not sacrosanct anymore. Even then it is big enough to give a
platform and what he needed to do was to take bold and politically unorthodox
decisions to claim the top political position.
That track he seemed to have lost by now. Yes, given the
political equations and the poor and shabby political opposition, he has all
the chances to become the prime minister in future, if not in 2014, but then, he
will be just yet another politician forced on the Indian masses and not loved
by them.
Rahul needs to ponder over these:
Didn’t the Mahatma’s teachings (Rahul said in a Gujarat rally that the Mahatma was his role-model) tell him
to practice ‘walk the talk’, something that the Mahatma always maintained?
Didn’t following the Mahatma tell our next
prime-ministerial candidate that he must truly know the India
Didn’t reading the Mahatma tell Rahul Gandhi that personal integrity is all and the country’s first family must come clean on corruption
allegations instead of blatantly doing cover-ups something done audaciously in
Robert Vadra’s case of inappropriate land acquisitions?
Now only Rahul can tell us if the country has still the chances
to get back in Rahul the ‘politician with a difference’. That would, indeed, be
the only political soul-searching for him.
His potato and computer anecdotes would self-correct then and the masses would find the Connect that both, the politician and
masses, seek.
©/IPR: Santosh Chaubey - http://severallyalone.blogspot.com/
