Rahul gets into Rajiv's shoes but steps ahead

Rahul Gandhi is the Congress party’s shining star. He convinced the party to fight Lok Sabha elections in Uttar Pradesh alone, and reaped a harvest of 21 MPs.

Rahul, 39, was the party’s star campaigner, holding 106 rallies across 230 constituencies in the country. He wooed the youth, rejuvenated the Congress in Uttar Pradesh, and spiritedly defended Prime Minister Manmohan Singh against the BJP’s attacks.



The Congress general secretary, who became MP for the first time from Amethi in 2004, spoke about Dalits, development and the youth. His strategy seemed to have worked well: in Uttar Pradesh the Congress has 12 more MP since 2004 and the party is full of confidence after being resigned to playing a bit role in the state for years.

Has Rahul proved himself as a politician? Is he a better politician than his father, Rajiv Gandhi? CNN-IBN’s Sagarika Ghose asked this to BJP leader Sudhanshu Mittal, Vinod Sharma, political editor of the Hindustan Times, and Congress Lok Sabha MP Sandeep Dikshit.

“The Congress looks at Rahul Gandhi as a person who has huge amount of potential. There is a lot in him and in his own quiet little way he has turned the party around. He has proved his mettle,” said Dikshit.

Don’t “eulogise” Rahul, said Mittal. “Nothing succeeds like success and nothing fails like failure. Every state has its own politics--the Congress has not win in Madhya Pradesh or Chhattisgarh,” he said. “The Congress won just two seats in Bihar--why didn’t Rahul’s plan (of fighting elections alone) work there?”

Mittal claimed the upper castes in Uttar Pradesh voted for the Congress after trusting Mulayam Singh Yadav and then Mayawati in earlier elections.

Rahul and Rajiv

The “benefit of doubt” must go to Rahul when he is compared with his father in politics, said Sharma.

“Rajiv came into politics in the backdrop of tragedy (the assassination of his mother, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi). He got one of the most sweeping mandates in the history of India. So I think the benefit of doubt must goes to Rahul rather than Rajiv. Rahul was able to combine aspirations with identity in UP,” he said.

“Rahul comes into politics in the backdrop of a fractured polity. He comes in the backdrop of a party which is moribund,” said Sharma.

Rahul’s success didn’t impress Mittal. “Rajiv Gandhi was tried, tested and rejected. Rahul has not been tested and yet he is a grand hope,” said Mittal, who called the general secretary’s visits to Dalit homes “tokenism”.

Congress leaders’ statements that Rahul could be Prime Minister anytime he wants reeks of dynastic politics and sycophancy, he said.

Dikshit rejected the charge. “It is clear that Sonia Gandhi and Rahul have come from a dynasty but remember they are being voted in. Two-hundred-six seats coming to the Congress and 262 seats coming to the UPA is not just dynasty. It is people of India reposing faith in a set of ideology, a set of programmes and a set of leaders the Congress and the UPA represent,” said Dikshit.