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As 2019 election approaches, Rahul Gandhi wears a new mask

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Anant Chetan
Anant Chetanhttp://infiniteseaofopportunities.com
An aficionado blogger and an engineer by profession. By qualifications, a Masters in Embedded System Design.

As the country inches towards May 2019 via December 2018, the election festival blossoms with the ever intensifying endeavors of the participants. Indians would be overwhelmed by their creative work, catchy one liners, colorful posters and sensational speeches. Mr. Gandhi has already started showcasing his old and ageing ship in a different light. During the no confidence motion a few weeks ago, he had discovered a new variant of hug “a lap hug” and now is officially masquerading as the messenger of love, peace and harmony. All the interactions he recently had in Germany and the UK played one song again and again like a broken record.

In addition to that, by some miracle, the students in different countries and different schools ended up asking the same questions, phrased differently. How? I don’t know. Any body who assimilated enough courage to listen to any of the speeches or conversation would understand that he made his “transformation” after fifteen years of struggle ostensibly conspicuous. Along with the usual rhetoric revolving around RSS/BJP bashing, lynchings, caste suppression (as if Germany and England would fix the problems for us), some other gibberish, a strong reference to love and hate, peace, non-violence, attentive listening, acknowledging mistakes/issues was made. You could have a look at one of his interactions here:

People believe in whatever they want to believe in and have prejudices for. Isn’t this a fundamental reason why fake news peddlers succeed in their endeavors? Peace, love, compassion, empathy, non-violence, etc. are quite sophisticated practices and everyone would like to believe in them. Wouldn’t you?  But how do we know if he was not bluffing? How do we know if it is not just a mask designed to cover the gory and ugly details enriched by all sorts of malpractices? If the same speech was given by some other person say Mr. Kejriwal (also a PM aspirant), it would have been comparatively easier to digest. Simply because he or his party has never ruled India and whatever he says he is or he would do will be bought “as is”. Wasn’t this one of the reasons why he won 67 out of 70 seats in Delhi Assembly election?

On the contrary, we have already been a witness to a variety of faces or masks that Congress donned in the past. The history of 20th century India which was predominantly governed by Congress proves one thing, Congress is anything but the things Mr. Gandhi mentioned in his interactions. You don’t have to go by what I say, you could google it, pick any history book and connect the dots. If Congress has to become what Mr. Gandhi suggests, the party will have to part ways with “the family”.

We all wear masks, and the time comes when we cannot remove them without removing some of our own skin. – André Berthiaume

Mr. Gandhi with the help of an instrument called “non-violence” reincarnated the original Gandhi Ji to fight his battle which he is finding it difficult to barely survive let alone win. “Non-Violence” is a highly intellectual friendly phrase and is appreciated and fancied by many. But when did Congress practice it? Were the four wars that India fought under the Congress’ leadership non-violent? Was sending Indian soldiers to a war where they did not even represent India during World War I and II  an act of non-violence? It looks as if any decision taken by Gandhi Ji or his namesakes leading to violence will be categorized as non-violent and anything apart from this would be called violence. That is why the freedom fighters like Bhagat Singh and Subhash Chandra Bose were  not entertained in Congress and were deemed violent. There are other myriad of instances like this. And of course, torturing and slaughtering animals for all sorts of “justified” reasons is also non-violence. Talking about animals does look irrelevant when people were getting killed non-violently.

He claimed, his party is compassionate and works out the different problems by actually listening and understanding others’ viewpoint. These are actually quite precious qualities, and it takes a lot of time and patience in inculcating them. But easier said than done. It is reasonably easy to preach others about what they did and what lead to the formation of which group. We don’t have to go to Syria to find an example of this. Why couldn’t the congress lead governments solve Kashmir issue in more than five decades? Even if we assume that Kashmir is a complex problem and needs time (although congress wants BJP to fix it in five years) there is no paucity of issues which would annihilate Mr. Gandhi’s novice narrative. Who was responsible for exacerbation of Naxal issue? Why wasn’t the crisis nipped in the bud? I hear a lot of rhetoric about Adivasis and Tribal people, why weren’t their issues handled sincerely with love and compassion? And of course around 15,000 people (civilians, Naxals and security forces) who died during the confrontation were killed “non-violently”. In fact it was their Prime Minister, Mr. Manmohan Singh who declared it as the most serious internal threat. Enough has already been spoken and written about 84 riots. Were traits like compassion, listening and understanding different view points discovered after 2014?

Exorbitantly profound enlightenment happened when the epitome of monopoly conveyed that “monopoly” is refraining the country from delivering upto its maximum  potential. There are simply no words for this eye-opening expose. I think there is a different dictionary that is not accessible to general public, all the words “non-violence”, “love & compassion”, “monopoly”, “listening”, “empathy” etc. have different meanings which we are not aware of. Just a small question, how many years did INC function without a member from Nehru-Gandhi family leading?

“You wear a mask for so long, you forget who you were beneath it”

Although all his interactions were exuding his love and compassion towards BJP/RSS; his listening credentials were also revealed in the same interaction where he boasts of them.  At around 46:00 minutes in the video attached below, he threw a question at the audience seeking reasons as to why the quality of debates in parliament in  the 50s and 60s was better than today. Some guy from the audience answered: “because there was no effective opposition at that time”. Did Mr. Gandhi listen or acknowledge the answer? No! he snubbed the answer and said what he wanted to say or was told to say, even though the guy was correct. And how correct is Mr. Gandhi’s answer that he “imposed” over the audience is upto the viewers to decide.

Even after all this hate mongering and denigration of the country in an attempt to attack BJP, he pulled out “the Bhramastra” from his quiver which he and only he can use (technically Mrs. Vadra could also use): the sad demise of his father and India’s former prime minister Mr. Rajiv Gandhi. He reminded everyone how weak Indian security forces had become then, which could not protect the country’s prime minister. Him sympathizing with somebody who was responsible for the assassination of one of India’s Prime Ministers indicates his desperation for power. Should criminal offenses be overlooked and the criminals be left alone? What is the significance of justice? Is he trying to promote a “jungleraj” or an “animal kingdom” instead of a civilized society where punitive actions against perpetrators are sought?

He mentioned acknowledging and accepting a problem is the first step towards solution, indeed it is. Will he or his party acknowledge that issues like NRC, Kashmir, etc. were the mistakes they committed? Or it was just a salesmen pitch he made in a futile attempt to find buyers? Congress has already mastered the art of masquerading, Gandhi scion is just taking the legacy forward. Their claim that Gandhi-Nehru family was not in control during UPA1&2 is enough to advertise their creativity with Masks.

“No man, for any considerable period, can wear one face to himself and another to the multitude, without finally getting bewildered as to which may be the true.” – Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Scarlet Letter, 1850

Please have a look at: Rahul Gandhi: A Role Model or a Wrong Model as well as my personal blog Infinite Sea of Opportunities

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Anant Chetan
Anant Chetanhttp://infiniteseaofopportunities.com
An aficionado blogger and an engineer by profession. By qualifications, a Masters in Embedded System Design.
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