Congress has pulled up an ace to counter the Modi wave in urban areas – Rahul Gandhi.
The battle lines are being drawn again. Some were beginning to think that the Congress had been written off in Gujarat because of the party’s chronic power struggle and the lack of clarity about who would be its face in the state. But the grand old party has pulled up an ace to counter the Modi wave in urban areas – Rahul Gandhi. Prima facie, the party seems to be making the first attempt to take on Modi and the BJP in their stronghold, urban Gujarat.
The Gandhi scion will be pitted in a long-drawn eyeball-to-eyeball battle with Modi on the latter’s home turf, starting Friday afternoon, when he arrives on a maiden visit to Ahmedabad’s Gujarat College. Gandhi will close the Congress’s month-long Abhay Udaan programme. Gandhi, who is aggressively reviving the Youth Congress all over the country, will be launched as the Congress’s new face for the urban, upper-middle-class vote bank.
According to the initial indications coming from the Congress, Gandhi, who never campaigned during the December 2007 assembly elections, will canvass extensively in Gujarat over the next two months. The detailed strategy for the operation is ready but is being kept under wraps by the state Congress. However, it is expected that Gandhi will interact with the state’s leading urban elite, who are currently not a part of the Congress.
The soft-spoken son of Rajiv and Sonia Gandhi is understood to be assertive and clear about his ideas of ‘reforming’ the party. It is bold of the Gujarat Congress to pit Gandhi against Modi in Gujarat in the wee years of Gandhi’s political career. But the Congress is rather nonchalant about it.
“The dynamics of state-level elections and Lok Sabha elections are very different. Gandhi is not expected to indulge in gimmicks or rhetoric like Modi,” said a source in the Congress who is privy to the details of Gandhi’s visit. “Gandhi shows a natural flair while dealing with the urban masses. He will not address large public gatherings but will concentrate on small, focused meetings, as part of the Jan Sampark Abhiyaan.”
The Congress had avoided calling Gandhi for campaigning during the assembly elections but, for the Lok Sabha polls, he is the first high-profile campaigner for the party.
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