Former Union Minister Salman Khurshid has declared Rahul Gandhi the future King of Democracy. In the past, the same person had declared Sonia Gandhi the mother of our nation. Aided by such copious groveling, Salman Khurshid continues to prosper within the party.
The statement again reveals the undemocratic ethos of the Congress party that encourages worship of the ‘One True Family’ instead of leadership based on merit and ability. Between an able administrator and a charlatan Gandhi, the Congress party will always choose the latter.
Nevertheless, there are important things which Khurshid has gotten wrong here. And that must be pointed out.
Rahul The Reluctant
While senior leaders are ever willing to hand over the reins of the Congress party to Rahul Gandhi, the former party president himself is quite unwilling to serve in that position. Instead, he is much more comfortable swimming in the ocean and performing push-ups at public events.
Despite being urged to take up that position, Rahul Gandhi has fled from that role just like voters have fled from the Congress party, leaving the party in the lurch. Thus, while Salman Khurshid appears overeager to crown Rahul King, there is a great possibility that should the occasion ever arise, he may find that Gandhi is off to one of his vacations on the day of the event.
The Crown is not given, it is earned
One of the most important aspects of Kingship is that it is never given, it is earned. And Salman Khurshid will be hard pressed to answer precisely what has Rahul Gandhi achieved so far in his career as a politician in order to justify the title.
Under his leadership, the Congress party has floundered and fumbled from one defeat to another and the only success to his credit is that the party has managed to do so without any loss of enthusiasm.
A King who needs sycophants like Khurshid to secure his position is no King at all.
Kings lead from the front
A King must lead his army from the front. Faced against great odds, a King must instill faith in his followers and offer them hope even when none exists. Rahul Gandhi, on the other hand, was among the first to flee the battlefield following the party’s defeat in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections.
He quit from the post of president and since then, despite numerous pleas from sycophants, he has strongly refused to return to his role. Now we are in a situation where Sonia Gandhi’s tenure as the interim president of the party has lasted for a longer time than her son’s tenure as permanent president.
Furthermore, instead of leading the fight from the front, Rahul Gandhi has meekly sought help from the Joe Biden administration to aid him in his efforts to defeat the BJP. That is not very regal behaviour.
The Clown King
The world has seen great kings and cruel monarchs but it appears unlikely that it will ever be ready for a Clown King. A King, by default, is meant to inspire respect and loyalty on his own merit. The scion of the Nehru-Gandhi Parivar inspires neither.
Sycophants such as Khurshid are loyal to the Nehru-Parivar, not Rahul Gandhi himself. If the Parivar had a more able scion, then they would have flocked to him instead. But, as it so happens, they have a clown on one hand and on the other, they have Priyanka Gandhi who is yet to demonstrate higher intellect than her brother.
Kings who wake up in the morning at night or believe that they can pour potatoes from one end and extract gold from the other end of the machine are unlikely to be received well by the masses.
Democracies have no place for Kings
The Congress party might have cleared a position for a royal family within itself but Democracies have no place for kings. The party might suffer under the delusion that it can slap a King on the face of the electorate but they will find that citizens do not have time for such nonsense.
Democracy is the very antithesis of a Monarchy. One Narendra Modi can rise from being a tea seller in his childhood to leading the destiny of a population over a billion strong. Narendra Modi has earned that position through his own merit and ability, things that are alien to the Congress party.
Salman Khurshid may like to believe that Rahul Gandhi is the King of Democracy but the Indian electorate has made its choice clear. And unfortunately for him, the chosen one is not from the Nehru-Gandhi Parivar.
