Rahul Gandhi - A case study of contrasts

As a journalist, I feel the pressure of making an opinion about almost everything under the sun. However tempted I may be to allow both sides of the argument to prevail, I realise I am not "I am" till I have an opinion on issues.

A recent issue on which my faculties have eluded me is Rahul Gandhi. Rahul Gandhi, son of India's most powerful woman Sonia Gandhi (who often makes it to the Forbes list of most powerful people in world also)has become a phenomenon in India politics.

Till sometime ago the scion of the Gandhi family to some was like a prince to Indian dynasty and to others a foreign educated bloke who understands nothing about the realities of grassroot politics. Rahul Gandhi born with a silver spoon in his mouth has attended the best schools of India and pursued his further education at Cambridge. He worked with a company in London followed by some work experience in an Indian company too.

It does look like that Rahul has lived a life very protected from Bharat which is not India. However he is making efforts to travel the distance between his India to our Bharat by way of pillion riding to Bhatta Parsaul and sometimes taking Padyatras to Aligarh. And recently with his strategy to lend his shoulder to the cause of farmers, he has become a phenomena of sorts.

A young politician who comes laden with a foreign education but talks farming and not urbanisation is a bit of a contrast. Especially, with his party leading the coalition at centre has at the helm at least four prominent people who talk reforms in their sleep also. However, Rahul has positioned himself differently and his positioning is not just connecting him with his vote bank but also inviting attention of the old-guard politicians who had only recently started talking "development".

On many a occasions however, Rahul has let us down with his gaucherie. Whether it was his much publicised arrest in U.P following his visit to Bhatta Parsaul or undertaking "Padyatra to Aligarh". It appears as if he is either unaware of the disconnect between centre and state politics or he plainly assumes that people are incognizant of the fact that land acquisition policies in states are bad because there hasn't been any change in the archaic land acquisition bill 1894 and that required centre to bring about a responsible bill.

In either case, to me he appears either naive or scheming. The distance between the meaning of these two words may be apogean, however for Rahul neither would be very becoming.