# OPINION : Wednesday, July 01, 2020. 7:36. PM. : 2210.

1. #How Rahul Gandhi became 'Pappu' of politics : July 23, 2018 : Prabhash K Dutta : India Today : Media Report.

#Pappu became the name to mock Rahul Gandhi in the run up to 2014 Lok Sabha elections. After the electoral defeat of the Congress, many party leaders too referred to him as Pappu.

*Congress president Rahul Gandhi is often mocked as "Pappu" by his political rivals and on social media. (Photo: PTI)

HIGHLIGHTS :

#PappuCII was top Twitter trend in India in April 2013

#Amit Shah referred to Rahul Gandhi as Pappu in October 2013

#In July 2014, a Congress leader wrote to Sonia mentioning Pappu

Taking a swipe at the BJP and its leaders including Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Congress president Rahul Gandhi has referred to himself as "Pappu" on a few occasions in recent months to drive a point that he represented a polite and civilised face of politics unlike the ruling party. But the word has stuck with for over five years.

Pappu became a mock-name for Rahul Gandhi in the run up to the 2014 Lok Sabha elections. The BJP leaders, workers and a committed band of supporters made sure that even a Google search for "Pappu" returned with the profile of Rahul Gandhi. And, if one goes by the talks in reporters' corridor, the term originated in the old guard of the Congress leadership, some of whom had once welcomed Sonia Gandhi in 1998-99 as "Gudiya".

1. But why Pappu?

The Congress showcased Rahul Gandhi as its face of future in November 2007 at its plenary session in Delhi's Talkatora Stadium. Those who were expecting him to deliver a speech like his father Rajiv Gandhi did 22 years earlier in 1985 - on the centenary of the Congress - returned home disappointed. Rahul's speech was abstract devoid of politics. Sample this: "What, after all, is poverty," Rahul Gandhi asked a delegation of about 3000 Congress workers before answering, "A poor person is one who is denied the opportunity to become rich."

The same year, 2007, came a Bollywood film titled, Pappu Paas Ho Gaya following a two-year-old TV advertisement for a chocolate brand. It tried to change the meaning attached to old Indian nickname that carried the meaning of an innocent boy to a dumb person. In 2008, another Bollywood movie had a chartbuster song, Pappu Can't Dance Sala.

Delhi went to polls in 2008 and the Delhi Election Commission (DEC) ran an ad-campaign, Pappu Can't Vote. The DEC decided to rerun the same ad-campaign for 2009 Lok Sabha elections. This enforced the notion that "Pappus" are supposed to do idiotic things when important works are pending.

2. Congress Shares Blame :

In the parallel world of governance, the UPA had entered the phase of "policy paralysis". Decision making had become slow and it was blamed on Rahul Gandhi's activism. Some of the senior Congress leaders made comments indicating that Rahul Gandhi was a "part-time" politician. In July 2012, Digvijay Singh - then considered as Rahul Gandhi's mentor - said, "He (Rahul) has been confining himself to student politics and youth politics. He should come into the mainstream of Congress party." Comments like this established Rahul Gandhi as an unwilling politician.

The year 2013 saw "Pappu" permanently stuck to Rahul Gandhi. He addressed the Confederation of Indian Industries on April 3, 2013 in New Delhi. That day, the top trending topic on Twitter in India was #PappuCII. The electrified IT Cell of the BJP left no stone unturned to make a "Pappu" out of Rahul Gandhi.

In October 2013, Amit Shah - best known till then as Narendra Modi's aide - referred to Rahul Gandhi as Pappu at a time when election campaign for 2014 polls was being relaunched by the BJP. He said, "The Congress thinks the prime minister's chair is Pappu's birthright. But this is a democracy, you need people's blessings, and people's blessings are with Narendra ModiWe have declared our PM candidate (Narendra Modi). Who will be the Congress candidate? Pappu? No, they won't make Pappu their candidate as they are afraid of losing."

3. Stamped After 2014 Loss :

After the Lok Sabha elections, there was virtual revolt in the Congress with many state leaders showing their lack of faith in Rahul Gandhi. Former Congress MP Late Gufran Azam from Madhya Pradesh wrote a letter to the then party president Sonia Gandhi in July 2014. He wrote,

"All parents want their child to become a doctor or engineer. But some wishes never get fulfilled because the child is unfit. Parents simply cannot force them to be successful. You (Sonia Gandhi) wished to make him (Rahul) a leader and got 10 years for it. But you failed to make him a leader. You failed to make him learn how to deliver a speech. He failed to acquire political acumen. He remains the same. We are tired of hearing people address him as 'Pappu' and 'Munna'. We feel ashamed."

In June 2017, another Congress leader - Vinay Pradhan from Uttar Pradesh - referred to his own the then party vice-president as Pappu, although to shower praise on him. He wrote in party's local WhatsApp group: "Rahul Gandhi is also known as Pappu by a section of people in this country Pappu could have easily become the Prime Minister of this country but he did not." Pradhan was later removed from all party positions.

It is not, however, certain who used the word Pappu first to mock Rahul Gandhi. Some have attributed it to AAP leader Kumar Vishwas, who contested from Amethi in 2014 Lok Sabha elections against Rahul Gandhi. Some other have attributed the remark to self-styled godman and rape accused Asaram, who reportedly mocked Rahul Gandhi as Pappu at a public rally around 2012-13.

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2. ##BJP calls Rahul Gandhi 'most irresponsible politician India has seen' : Jun 18, 2020 : DECCAN CHRONICLE : Media Report.

##Patra said India will win against all C’s -- Corona virus, standoff with China and Congress’s misinformation and propaganda.

*File image of Congress leader Rahul Gandhi. (PTI)

New Delhi: Congress leader Rahul Gandhi’s comment that Indian soldiers were sent "unarmed to martyrdom" at Galwan Valley during violent face off with China, drew sharp rebuttal from external affairs minister S Jaishankar on Thursday, while the ruling BJP described him as the “most irresponsible politician that India has seen.”

"Let us get the facts straight. All troops on border duty always carry arms, especially when leaving post. Those at Galwan on 15 June did so. Long-standing practice (as per 1996 & 2005 agreements) not to use firearms during faceoffs," tweeted Jaishankar in a reply to Gandhi's tweet.

Earlier during the day, Gandhi had tweeted: "How dare China kill our UNARMED soldiers? Why were our soldiers sent UNARMED to martyrdom?"

Later, he uploaded a video clip of himself tweeting, “China has committed a crime by killing India’s unarmed soldiers. I want to know who sent these unarmed soldiers in the harm’s way and why. Who is responsible.”

Calling Gandhi the “most irresponsible politician that India has seen,” the BJP asked him to first “read, understand and then speak” on issues. The BJP cited an agreement signed with China in 1996 that prohibits weaponry use within two kilometers on both sides of the LAC to defend the government.

It also asked him and the Congress president Sonia Gandhi to explain the principal opposition party had signed an MoU with the Chinese Communist Party in 2008 to “consult each other on bilateral, international and regional issues.” The ruling party argued that such agreements are signed only between two nations and not political organisations.

Gandhi’s fresh attack came a day after he asked defence minister Rajnath Singh why he did not name China in his tweet and why it took him two days to condole the deaths of 20 Army personnel.

Lashing out at the Congress leader, BJP’s Sambit Patra said Gandhi’s lack of faith in the Indian government in these times has shown how irresponsible he is and Gandhi should realise that when he speaks against the Prime Minister, it is not against an individual man, but against the leader of the country.

“If you (Gandhi) don’t have the basic knowledge regarding the issue, then you are the most irresponsible politician that India has seen..please read, understand and then speak on issues…do not spread lies,” said Patra while asserting that it is not India of 1962 but of 2020 and it will win against all C’s -- Corona virus, standoff with China and Congress’s misinformation and propaganda.

Accusing the Congress leader of acting in an “immature and irresponsible manner” by attacking the PM, Patra reminded him that the government has already called an all-party meeting on Friday over the border row.

“You (Gandhi) don’t trust the Indian PM, defence minister, home minister and even the Army chief, who do you trust then,” asked the BJP leader while pointing that the Congress leader had questioned the surgical strike and “family members” of Mr Gandhi were dinning with Chinese envoy during the 2017 Doklam crisis, which the “Congress first denied before acknowledging it.”

Referring to the MoU signed between the Congress and the Chinese ruling party CPC, Patra claimed that the MoU was signed to build relationship between the “Nehru Gandhi family in particular” and the China’s ruling party.

“This MoU was signed by the then Congress general secretary Rahul Gandhi and the then CPC general secretary Xi Jinping, in presence of the then Congress president Sonia Gandhi to consult each other on bilateral, international and regional issues. Will the Congress leader explain it,” asked the BJP spokesperson.

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3. ### Does the Indian Left have a future? : 22.06.19 : Ramachandra Guha : Telegraph : Media Report.

### Parliamentary communists have descended from the high of 2004 to the low of 2019

*If, in electoral terms, 2019 marks the nadir of the communist movement in India, the high point was 2004, when the communist parties had more than 60 seats in Parliament - A file picture

In the third week of May I found myself in Kerala. The Lok Sabha results were due in a few days; it seemed clear that, for the first time since Independence, the communists would be in single digits in the lower House of Parliament. It thus so happened that I was in India’s sole Left-ruled state on the eve of their eclipse as a national force.

I had come to the state to speak at the annual conference of the Kerala Sastra Sahitya Parishad. The KSSP was founded in the early 1960s by a group of teachers and activists. Its slogan is ‘Science for Social Revolution’. Over the years, it has done impressive work in disseminating scientific literature to citizens, and in cultivating a rational, evidence-based approach to solving social problems. It has published hundreds of books and pamphlets, and been very active in the environmental and popular health movements. I had long followed their work, and admired what they had done.

I took a flight from Bangalore, and was met at Thiruvananthapuram by three activists of the KSSP. Two were university teachers, in physics and economics respectively; the third worked in the state electricity board. All displayed a keen interest in public affairs and a strong commitment to social justice — this is common among teachers and public servants in Kerala, but rarer in other parts of India. We drove to the town of Pathanamthitta, where the conference was to be held. We stopped en route at a wayside Indian Coffee House, which, like all branches of this co-operative organization, had a picture above the till of the legendary communist leader, A.K. Gopalan.

The annual conference of the KSSP is held by rotation in each of the 14 districts of Kerala. The present conference was organized by the Pathanamthitta district branch, and hosted in the premises of a high school named after Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose. About a thousand delegates had come, from across Kerala. We ate together in a common dining hall, washing our dishes afterwards.

The KSSP is not a party organization. It has sometimes crossed swords with the state unit of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) — most famously during the Silent Valley controversy of the 1980s. Many of its members probably vote for the Congress (though few, if any, for the Bharatiya Janata Party). Nonetheless, in its origins and evolution, the KSSP was deeply influenced by the Left movement in Kerala. The egalitarian and inclusive spirit that I saw manifested this influence very clearly.

There is no organization like the KSSP in any other state in India. Not even in West Bengal, where the communists were in power for a far longer stretch. This may be because Bengali Marxism has always been inflected with a bhadralok idiom; it is literary and intellectual in nature, whereas Malayali Marxism is more pragmatic and down-to-earth.

If, in electoral terms, 2019 marks the nadir of the communist movement in India, the high point was 2004, when the communist parties had more than 60 seats in Parliament. Bengalis still lament Jyoti Basu not becoming prime minister in 1996. But, in retrospect, a far greater mistake was committed in 2004, when the CPI(M) and the Communist Party of India did not join the United Progressive Alliance government headed by Manmohan Singh. The United Front government of 1996-98 was in a minority, and even if Jyoti Basu had headed it, it would still have fallen within a couple of years . On the other hand, the UPA government ran for two full terms; had the communists joined the cabinet, and taken charge of such portfolios as education, health, and rural development, they could have helped improve people’s lives, while increasing the party’s visibility and profile across the country. Tragically, the CPI(M) was bound by Leninist dogma, which did not permit it to take up a supporting role in a ‘bourgeois government’.

At the national level, the parliamentary communists have descended from the high of 2004 to the low of 2019. Meanwhile, they are now out of office in Tripura and West Bengal, and are extremely unlikely to regain power in either of these states. Since Kerala usually alternates between the Left and the Congress, when assembly elections are next held the communists should find themselves in Opposition here as well.

In India today, some famous writers and artists think of themselves as being on the Left. So do some established scholars. However, in terms of its influence on politics and public life, the Indian Left has never been in a worse place. Can this change? Or is this political decline irreversible?

As I write this, against the backdrop of their near-rout in the last Lok Sabha elections, it is hard to think of the Left ever regaining the political salience it once had. But history acts in odd and unexpected ways. Who would have imagined that socialism would experience a resurgence in that most capitalist of countries, the United States of America? India remains a land marked by pervasive social inequalities. In theory, if not in practice, it remains fertile ground for the Left.

If the Left in India hopes or wishes to rise up from the ashes, then the first thing it must do is to become more Indian. In 1920, shortly before the Communist Party of India was established, the Mumbai Marxist, S.A. Dange wrote a pamphlet exalting Lenin over Gandhi. Ever since, Indian communists have found their heroes in a country other than India. They have venerated, in turn, the Germans Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, the Russians V.I. Lenin and Josef Stalin, Mao Zedong of China, Ho Chi Minh of Vietnam, the Cuban Fidel Castro, and the Venezuelan Hugo Chávez.

The problem with these foreigners is not just that they were foreigners. They were also totalitarians, who believed in a one-party State run by themselves. The likes of Lenin and Mao had no understanding of India or of Indian society; nor an appreciation of the virtues of multiparty democracy either. By worshipping them at the expense of home-grown thinkers such as Gandhi and Ambedkar, the communists found themselves out of sync with Indian realities.

Younger readers may not be aware that, parallel to the growth of communism in the 1920s, an indigenous socialist tradition also took shape in India. Its exemplars included Kamaladevi Chattopadhyay, Rammanohar Lohia, and Jayaprakash Narayan, all of whom had a more original understanding of Indian society than their communist contemporaries. The thinking of Kamaladevi on gender, of Lohia on class, of JP on political decentralization, was far sharper than of S.A. Dange or E.M.S. Namboodiripad on these subjects. This is because the socialists took their clues from what they observed on the ground, whereas the communists mechanically followed the path laid down by Lenin and Stalin.

Is it too late for Indian communists to learn from the heritage of Indian socialists? They can likewise seek to indigenize themselves, and perhaps even adopt the ‘socialist’ label. To the 21st-century mind, the word ‘communist’ is indelibly associated with tyranny and authoritarianism. On the other hand, the word ‘socialist’ is more benign. True, it has currently been misappropriated by a family firm run by Yadavs in Uttar Pradesh. But it may be worth the effort to recapture the label, and rework it to more worthy ends.

In the wake of the Lok Sabha elections, there is talk of the need to ‘unify’ the different communist parties, and bring them under one platform. Were that to happen, the new, unified, party would need a new name. I suggest it junk the word ‘communist’, and characterize itself as ‘democratic socialist’ instead. That might be a modest first step towards a renewal of the Left, opening out for it a future in Indian politics, whereas at present it only has a past.

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"GOOD GOVERNANCE" :

4. #### Why BJP will rule India uninterrupted for the next 30 years, till 2049 : 5 June, 2019 : SHIVAM VIJ : The Print : Media Report.

#### After Modi, it will be Shah. Rahul Gandhi will make sure Indian voters never trust the Congress again.

*Narendra Modi and Amit Shah | Photo: T. Narayan | Bloomberg

In a job interview, the hiring manager decided to put the candidate at ease with small talk. He asked the candidate, what’s your favourite fruit? Considering it is the season of mangoes, surely you like mangoes?

Instead of giving a simple answer, the candidate replied, “I do Vipassana”. The manager was flummoxed. What’s Vipassana got to do with any fruit?

The candidate went on to explain, “The mind constructs the flavour of the fruit. You can like or dislike any fruit you want. You can choose to like mango, you can choose to hate it.”

That was bizarre, felt the manager. How could you choose to like or hate mangoes at will? The candidate explained further, “You can choose to like poor people, you can choose to hate them.”

Where, how and why did poor people come into a question about his favourite fruit! The manager kept a straight face and let the candidate explain further.

“You construct everything in your mind,” the candidate said. “The mind decides everything. I might start off hating someone, but after a bit of interaction, I’ll see things through their eyes, and be like: Actually, I like him; he’s great’.”

By this time the candidate looked like he was lost in his own make-believe world where the mind runs amok without fear and the head is held a bit too high. Just then, the candidate returned to the question and said: “But to answer your question: I like mangoes, I like bananas, I never used to like carrots, but now I do. I never used to like asparagus, but I do now.”

Do you think the manager hired the candidate after this interaction? Surely not. If a candidate speaks so much nonsense in a job interview, how will anyone get any work done from him?

The conversation is real, except this was not a job interview. This was Rahul Gandhi speaking to India Today magazine a few weeks ago.

1. India rejects Rahul :

The 2019 Lok Sabha election result has been decisive. Voters have not just voted Modi back to power, they have resoundingly rejected Rahul Gandhi. Modi clearly benefited from making the election a presidential contest against Gandhi.

Many expected the Congress to at least double its seats, increase its vote-share a bit, if not cross 100. Correspondingly, the BJP was widely expected to shed at least a few seats. Such a result would have given us a sense of incremental progress in the Congress party’s fortunes. The Congress likes to think its eventual return to power is almost inevitable. Incremental progress would have bolstered the case.

Instead, the Congress has remained almost where it was in 2014. In fact, it has actually lost seats and vote-share in the Hindi heartland. Rahul Gandhi lost his own family seat of Amethi.

The Congress vote share increased from 19.3 per cent to just 19.5 per cent. Its seats increased from 44 to just 52. The writing on the wall is unambiguous — India has rejected Rahul Gandhi.

The dislike for Rahul Gandhi is so strong that people prefer Modi even if can’t create jobs. The revulsion is not so much for the Congress but for Gandhi. It comes from Rahul Gandhi often not making sense in his utterances, like talking about the mind, Vipassana and poor people when asked about fruits.

2. When will Rahul Gandhi retire?

Whether or not Rahul Gandhi remains the president of the Congress party, he will continue to be its public face, its de facto prime ministerial candidate. His ageing mother or obedient sister won’t come in the way. There’s hardly any mass leader of consequence left to rebel.

So, how long will Rahul be around? There is no retirement age in Indian politics, but people tend to be around till 80. Manmohan Singh was 81 when he left the PM’s office. Vajpayee was 80 in 2004.

Rahul Gandhi is 48, will turn 49 this month and probably celebrate his birthday somewhere in Europe as he usually does. It is safe to assume that he will be leading his family business, the Congress party, with or without ceremonial titles for the next 30 years or so. With a warped thought process that makes him talk about Vipassana and poor people when asked about fruits and flavours, Rahul Gandhi will make sure the BJP keeps winning election after election.

If this seems unimaginable, think of Gujarat. The Congress has not won an election there since 1995, staying out of power for 24 years.

The Gujarat model has now been adopted by the country at large. Even when people are deeply unhappy with the BJP, as they were in Gujarat in 2017, they will still vote the BJP to power because the Congress just doesn’t look like an option.

Similarly, Rahul Gandhi will make sure the Congress never looks like an option in national politics. People will continue to fear handing over the nation’s keys to a man who can’t tell his mangoes from his Vipassana.

3. See you in 2049 :

There will be challenges from regional leaders and local politics, but at the national level, the BJP will continue to override anti-incumbency with the persona of Narendra Modi, who is only 68. All that Modi has to do to win elections is ask people if they would prefer Rahul Gandhi over him as PM.

Modi will be 78 in 2029. By that time, he would have served three terms as the prime minister. He might then pass on the job of saving India from Rahul Gandhi to his successor, Amit Shah. Currently the home minister, Shah is only 54. Come 2029 and Shah will be a ‘ripe young’ 64, and could easily serve another three terms as prime minister until the summer of 2044. Rahul Gandhi will be 73 then and still eligible to be a PM. That should make it easy for Yogi Adityanath, who is two years younger than Gandhi.

4. Don’t blame Vipassana :

In these 30 years, there will be a lot of churning in Indian politics but, just like in Gujarat, the Congress party’s captive vote-share won’t let this churning add up to much. Just like anti-Congressism failed before Indira Gandhi, anti-BJPism will fail for want of a uniting national force against Modi-Shah.

In the BJP-Congress binary states like Gujarat, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh, a third force has often tried to come up and replace the Congress. While the Congress is too weak to defeat the BJP, it is too strong to give way to another force. This is what Yogendra Yadav means when he calls the Congress an “obstacle”. The Congress is more interested in retaining the opposition space than occupying treasury benches.

*The constituencies marked in orange are the ones which the BJP won against the Congress. These were 166 in 2014 and 175 in 2019. Image credit: ElectionsInIndia.com)

The Congress party’s slow decline will likely mirror what happened to the Liberal Party in UK, which was a major political force from 1850s till World War I but started declining thereafter. It didn’t, however, die immediately. It dissolved as late as 1988, its remnants merging with the Social Democrats to form what is today known as the Lib Dems.

It is only when Rahul Gandhi leaves the stage, and the Congress party concedes defeat and starts merging with the regional parties, that a new counter-politics to the BJP will emerge. Until then, India is likely to see uninterrupted, opposition-free, single-party rule by the BJP.

In the unlikely event that Rahul Gandhi decides to change his career and become a full-time spiritual guru, Modi-Shah will instantly start losing public support and elections. It won’t matter who the opposition figure is. It just has to be someone who has the ability to give a straight answer to a simple question like ‘What’s your favourite fruit?’

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JAI HIND

JAI BHARATHAM

VANDHE MATHARAM

BHARAT MATHA KI JAI

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