Congress general secretary Rahul Gandhi’s quip in Vijayawada that he should not be counted upon as the future prime minister is delightfully ambiguous. He did not say that he does not want to be the prime minister, nor did he say that he would not become one. He was careful and modest enough to say that the eventuality should not be presumed. The future is open-ended and it is possible for anyone to be prime minister, he said. That is good politics as well as good manners. There is something in this for Y Jaganmohan Reddy, the young Andhra Congress MP and son of YS Rajasekhara Reddy who has been making loud claims to the office of chief minister after his father’s tragic death.
It is quite possible that the young Gandhi is not too keen to lead the country, at least not yet because he understands the enormity of the task. He is realistic enough to realise that this country needs an experienced hand at the helm. His admiration for Manmohan Singh is genuine. But that said, it cannot be ignored that the Congress party wants the young Gandhi to be prime minister whether he wants to or not. It is party president Sonia
Gandhi, son Rahul and daughter Priyanka who stand between the party and Singh. If the party had its way, it would replace Singh and anoint Rahul as PM.
The relationship between the Nehru-Gandhi family and the Congress party is a case of pathological dependency. It is comparable to the relationship between the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). The BJP’s dependence on the RSS is morbid too. As one cannot blame the RSS entirely for the BJP’s refusal to stand on its own feet, it is not fair to castigate the Nehru-Gandhi family for the perverse refusal of the Congress party to behave in a manner befitting an old and distinguished national party. PV Narasimha Rao once defined the relationship between the party and the Nehru-Gandhis as that of an extended family. In the two major parties in the country, the ‘parivar’ factor has a weight all its own.
The Nehru-Gandhis are good for the Congress party going by its recent revival of its sagging political fortune under the family’s leadership. But what is good for the Congress is not necessarily so for the country. The billion-strong country has a need and even a right to expect new leaders, not scions of entrenched political families.
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