PICTURE SPEAK

RELUCTANT LEADER: Rahul Gandhi awaits his tryst with destiny

By dynasty standards, it was indeed a soft launch, a subdued prologue to an inevitable coronation. And the locale, oh well, the strangest of places. Still, Rahul Gandhi, heir apparent to India's oldest political mystique, chose Kabul to make the strongest symbolic statement of his 15-month-old career in politics. Sticking to the family tradition of excessive secrecy, it was only disclosed at the very last minute that Rahul would be accompanying Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to Afghanistan. Even the foreign office was not clear about the young MP's travel plans till it was absolutely necessary. In the end, there was more curiosity about the text messages he feverishly typed on his Nokia cell phone than any MoU signed by Manmohan and President Hamid Karzai.

HEIR RISING

1970: Born June 19. Goes to Doon School, St Stephen's, Delhi, and Cambridge, UK. 1999: Accompanies his mother and sister on campaign trail but keeps a low profile. 2002: Leaves job as financial consultant with London-based Monitor and shifts back to Delhi. 2004: Is elected to the Lok Sabha from Amethi. One year later, accompanies the prime minister to Afghanistan.

Being Gandhi Little, the story could not have been otherwise. Having been absent for most of the monsoon session of Parliament, he suddenly surfaced one Sunday morning in a natty beige suit to board Air-India One. His explanation was that the trip was the result of a "casual conversation" between the prime minister and him, but it sounded too glib. This was not some sightseeing weekend junket but a carefully calibrated moment in the grooming of the reluctant prince for the distant throne.

During the delegation level talks in Kabul, Rahul was mostly a silent observer, preferring to be on the sidelines. For a Gandhi, that was impossible modesty. As he realised that he was the event, SPG guards, led by family faithful B.V. Vanchoo, made a ring of protection around him. The media was kept well away. The Indian community in Afghanistan was luckier. At the Indian envoy's reception, Rahul waved enthusiastically to star-struck Indians, and quietly slipped away once Manmohan began to mingle with the visitors.

AMETHI

Trouble In The Backyard The people of Amethi are dejected with their MP. It is not just because he hasn't visited his constituency during the past three months but because they feel that no development work is being done. Even Congress workers who have been loyal to the Gandhi dynasty for decades are now criticising Rahul Gandhi. His aides are puzzled. They say he has spent over Rs 3 crore in Amethi out of his MP Local Area Development funds and other sources. Another Rs 1.06 crore has come from the funds of Rajya Sabha MPs Rajiv Shukla and Akhilesh Das while MLC Naseeb Pathan has contributed Rs 25 lakh to this VIP constituency. Rahul has set up seven telephone exchanges and a lower court in Amethi. Over 96 km of roads are being built, as is a trauma centre, an IIT and an oil refinery.   PICTURE SPEAK NOTHING TO SMILE ABOUT: Rahul campaigning in Amethi Admittedly, development, or the lack of it, has never been an issue in Amethi. The emotional bond with the Gandhi family was always enough to swing the votes. But that is now on the wane. According to his constituency office in Delhi, Rahul has visited Amethi 11 times in 15 months. "But he has only visited 10 blocks. Congress workers in the other seven blocks are still waiting to meet him," says a local Congressman. His constituents see his visits as mere photo-ops and not emotional interactions. Adds Ram Adhir, a 55-year-old Congress worker from Quasimpur village: "Rajivji used to spend substantial time with us. This is not the case with Rahul. That is why crowds are disappearing from his programmes and functions." The locals also don't agree with Rahul's charge that the Mulayam Singh Government is blocking his developmental projects. "How has Shri Prakash Jaiswal been able to make changes in Kanpur through the intervention of the Centre and our MP cannot?" fumes a dissatisfied voter. Rahul has made a list of projects that had been abandoned after the Congress was voted out of power at the Centre in 1996. This includes the now controversial petroleum technology institute and an oil refinery to be set up in Rae Bareli district in the Amethi constituency. Initially, the Petroleum Ministry had refused to sanction the technology institute. It took a letter from Sonia Gandhi for the petroleum minister to take a personal interest in the case. Many such promises made by Rajiv lie forgotten in foundation stones buried under the barren ground in and around Amethi. The once buzzing Jagdishpur industrial area now resembles a graveyard. Locals say that some industrialists visited Amethi a few months back but did not return. A youth group recently held demonstrations demanding the setting up of small-scale factories so that they could get jobs. "If the state government is not cooperating why can't Rahul hold dharnas?" asks a local Congress worker recalling how his sister Priyanka had threatened to lead an agitation in favour of a Dalit whose house had been demolished by the Mayawati regime. Mayawati had caved in to her demands. But under Rahul's raj, even the Centre has ignored Amethi. "The petroleum, health and surface transport ministers have visited the area but these were only cosmetic visits," says a party functionary. Rahul's aides may claim that he has done a lot for Amethi but it seems too little. He needs to do more. -By Subhash Mishra in Amethi

Actually, his introduction to the world beyond Amethi began earlier. The prime minister, obviously concerned with the education of Jawaharlal Nehru's great-grandson, gave Rahul leave of absence from Parliament to attend a conference on governance in Germany. Before that, the Congress had sent him to South Africa to receive the Oliver Tambour Companion Prize, which was posthumously given to Nehru. According to professional family panegyrists, Rahul impressed President Thabo Mbeki with his knowledge of South Africa, a country he visited earlier in 1996. These tours, taken together, form part of Mission Rahul, managed by invisible hands in the Family.

And they followed a pattern. In the sepia pages of the dynastic history, young Indira was an endearing-and conspicuous-appendage to Nehru's foreign forays. For Rajiv Gandhi, after Sanjay's death, it was an accidental but steady blossoming in the shadow of the mother, a leader of mass magnetism. Rahul, despite the best efforts by a party that can breathe only in the vicinity of a Gandhi, is caught between the glory of tradition and the uncertainty of reality. His grandmother as well as father took their political graduation during the high noon of Congressism, and saw power at play from the closest quarters. Rahul too owes his princely privilege to the mystique of his surname but-here comes the difference-his mother has a long way to go before becoming Mother India like Indira. Sonia's power has not reached the level of what the Great Dead in the family had in their lifetime. The Grand Old Party itself is a lean parody of its old self. Hardly singular in its hold over India, unconditionally dependent on smaller, demanding partners from the provinces to be in power.

The 35-year-old first-timer has a party legendary for its sycophancy at his feet. Still, his mind is yet to be revealed, at least to those who are not his friends. As a young parliamentarian, his words, infrequent as they are, have made no difference. The inheritor, oscillating between page one, page three and Amethi, is yet to be tutored in mass politics. He has to face a crowd larger than he encountered at Kabul. Still, the party needs a Gandhi after Manmohan, and that Gandhi is unlikely to be Sonia, or even Priyanka, initially thought to be the natural heir to the grandmother. It is Rahul.

Accordingly, the Congress has an ambitious debut drawn out for him. Step two of his political induction will be in October where Rahul is expected to be made general secretary at the Congress plenary in Hyderabad. He will also be a member of the CWC, the party's highest decision-making body, which in reality is far below the family in power hierarchy. Sonia, Rahul and Priyanka, it was this troika that decided on Sonia's great renunciation.

PICTURE SPEAK

GLOBAL DEBUT: Rahul with Foreign Minister Natwar Singh (right) in Kabul

But very few know what Rahul Gandhi stands for. He says that he is interested in poverty and development. Yet he was absent when Parliament passed the Rural Employment Guarantee Bill. Unlike his peers, the first-time MP is yet to make his maiden speech. Yet, every Congressman remembers Rahul's two-minute special intervention. According to Pilot, "After Rahul spoke, the results were immediate. The farmers have got their dues." But as the Chosen One, Rahul needs to see beyond Uttar Pradesh. "He has his career plan all chalked out," says Congress MP Rajeev Shukla, "he chooses carefully before he makes a move." Lest he makes a wrong move, Rahul is regularly briefed by senior civil servants on policy matters. Recently, he was invited by Montek Singh Ahluwalia to attend a briefing on the Bharat Nirmaan project. He is also in constant touch with Sam Pitroda and V. Krishnamurthi.

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