Congress needs to nurture Rahul: Not goad him on when he is unprepared

I believe that the Congress is loading Rahul Gandhi with some really unrealistic expectations. To be fair, there is nothing terribly wrong with Rahul Gandhi. But he is simply not capable of working out a new paradigm for the party or for Indian politics at large, writes Madhu Kishwar in DNA.

Rahul’s no Obama...at least not yet
I believe that the Congress is loading Rahul Gandhi with some really unrealistic expectations. If you expect someone to wave a magic wand over what increasingly appears to be a moribund party and revive it with the sheer force of his personality or charisma, you are asking for too much. And remember that Rahul Gandhi is not a Barrack Obama. You need real genius to pull off that kind of a miracle.

To be fair, there is nothing terribly wrong with Rahul Gandhi. But he is simply not capable of working out a new paradigm for the party or for Indian politics at large. He is no doubt a good guy, but he is not competent to handle the enormous load he has been stuck with. There is a problem with this role that he is supposed to be taking on. On the one hand, he is under training — a large team of intellectuals is supposedly engaged in training him to take charge and become a good politician. On the other hand, he is supposed to be also playing a leader to the party and a potential PM. This is like some on-the-job-training and it doesn’t work.

It is clear that Rahul is only an average political talent. And he is incapable of dealing with the huge agenda the Congress has piled on him. Why just him? Any inexperienced young politician would crack under it. It is terrible to be brought into politics as though you were born to rule. Or to be told that one has to come to power because one is born into a certain family. Everyone in the Congress has to dwarf himself or herself in the public arena so that Rahul can appear tallest and can shine like no other. He is not treated like a young person who is finding his feet in politics. He has been invested with almost semi-divine powers to prop up the Congress’ sagging fortunes.

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(Madhu Kishwar is a senior fellow at the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies.)