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There is huge political turmoil currently in India with national elections only two months away. The two national parties, the incumbent secular center-left Congress and the right-wing Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), are locked in an intense political fight. All opinion polls have indicated that the BJP will emerge as the single largest party.
The BJP is running a presidential style campaign centered on Narendra Modi, who heads the government in the western Indian state of Gujarat. Modi, like many leaders of his party, is described by the Indian intelligentsia as a divisive figure. He was in charge of Gujarat in 2002 when riots were orchestrated against the Muslim minority. Hundreds, mostly Muslims, died in that pogrom.
Modi is pitted against Rahul Gandhi, who is in his early 40s. Son of the late Rajiv Gandhi and current Congress President Sonia Gandhi, Rahul has been variously described as a reluctant warrior and hesitant politician. He was formally inducted into politics nearly 10 years ago and has been a member of Parliament for quite some time. But he has not done much talking for one to form a solid opinion about him.
He campaigned in the two important states of Uttar Pradesh and Bihar sometime back but did not have much success. When his party won the general elections in 2009, there was a widespread belief that he would be made prime minister. He declined and instead Manmohan Singh continued for another term. That term has now come to an end. But Congress is in a state of disrepair, key allies have ditched it, and a new party led by Arvind Kejriwal has stolen its thunder.
That Rahul is a recluse can be gauged from the fact that in his 10 years in public life, he has never given interviews to broadcast or print media outlets. The media has obtained all its sound bites from his election campaign speeches or the occasional interaction with journalists.
When he gave his first television interview last month with Arnab Goswami from Times Now television channel, the whole nation came to a standstill. Rahul fielded the questions admirably and honestly. Like a canny politician, he did not beat around the bush when answering difficult questions.
India is a complex country and opinion polls have gotten it wrong many times. In 2004, for instance, the opinion polls had indicated a landslide victory for the then ruling BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA). The results surprised all the political pundits when Congress emerged victorious despite the BJP’s multimillion-dollar advertisement campaign entitled “India Shining.”
Something similar might happen this time because television stations and opinions polls concentrate mostly on urban voters and metropolitan cities. The real India lives in rural areas where Congress has traditionally done well. If it does so, then Rahul will get the credit.
So who is Rahul Gandhi? What are his political credentials? An “authoritative” biography of him by two seasoned and well-respected journalists, Jatin Gandhi and Veenu Sandhu, throws interesting light on his persona, ideas, vision, political temperament and political philosophy. The two journalists have done meticulous research, by talking to everyone around him and poring over thousands of press reports and video clippings to produce the 270-page hardbound book published by Penguin-Viking.
In the words of the writers, the book is not a SWOT — strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats — analysis of Rahul Gandhi’s plans and the Congress Party’s prospects. The narrative simply tells the story of what he is up to and how it will affect the voter and average Indian.
India in general and the Congress Party in particular are going through an interesting phase. The aging old guard is slowly, and at times, reluctantly making way for the younger lot represented, at least within Congress, by Rahul. The army of young people he is using to build the party includes those who have never given politics a serious thought. That Rahul belongs to a political dynasty and yet aspires to create a Congress where merit is not devoured by hereditary succession is a contradiction that throws up a whole range of interesting possibilities and challenges.
Rahul is very candid when discussing the issue. He is quoted on more than one occasion in the book as saying that he cannot deny the fact that he is a dynast and that his great-grandfather (Jawaharlal Nehru), his grandmother (Indira Gandhi) and his father (Rajiv Gandhi) were all prime ministers. “If I had not come from my family, I wouldn’t be here. You can enter the system either through family, friends or money. Without family, friends or money, you cannot enter the system. My father was in politics. My grandmother and great-grandfather were in politics. This is a problem. I am the symptom of this problem. I want to change it,” says Rahul.
The book also has quotes from his sister, the charismatic Priyanka Gandhi, who seemingly knows him best. “One thing I know about my brother is that he has this ability to focus on what he wants to do. The great thing about him as a politician is that he doesn’t have this thing that he absolutely has to succeed every time. And he is very good with things with which, perhaps, in the short term, he won’t succeed, but can see that there would be long-term success. He will work through that short-term failure.”
That essentially is Rahul, an idealistic young man with a vision to change the political system in India. At 44, he has age on his side. If Congress Party loses the elections this year, it may well be a blessing in disguise, because it will give him the opportunity to shape Congress Party the way he wants it.

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