NEW DELHI (Reuters) - The rise of Rahul Gandhi to India's top office is now more a question of when, not if. The handsome 41-year-old great-grandson of India's first ever prime minister has long been tipped as a future leader of the country, and incumbent Manmohan Singh said on Wednesday the party had not discussed him stepping down before his term ends in 2014 but he was ready for that.
"I don't mind young leaders taking over," Singh was quoted as saying in response to a question on Rahul replacing him.
The son of Congress party president Sonia Gandhi and heir to a dynasty that has ruled independent India for almost four decades of its 64-year history, the premiership isn't just Rahul's for the taking, it's almost his birthright.
 |
| Singh and Rahul at a recent political rally |
Despite Rahul's venture into politics so far yielding only mixed electoral results for Congress, senior party figures have in the past few weeks renewed calls for him to succeed Singh.
The 78-year-old Singh has been battered and bruised by corruption scandals and a yawning disconnect with the public has undermined his leadership and his party's standing, leading some to call for a change at the top before 2014.
Rahul is being cast as a youthful rejuvenator of a party and government drifting in the political doldrums.
Rahul's great-grandfather Jawaharlal Nehru announced to the world at midnight on Aug. 15, 1947, that India had re-awoken. He was born during the first premiership of his grandmother, Indira Gandhi, and saw his father, Rajiv, rule for five years.
And when his mother, the Italian-born Sonia who married into the family, led Congress to a surprising victory in 2004, Rahul's ascension seemed inevitable. He is already a year older than his father was when he assumed the premiership in 1984.
A general secretary of the ruling party and its campaign manager in India's most populous state, Rahul has kept his true political ambitious close to his chest.
Aides say he is intent on reviving the party in the populous heartland states in northern India, where Congress has been out of power for decades, before considering the top post.
But despite the public support of senior party figures such as Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee and Congress general secretary Digvijaya Singh, questions abound whether he has the abilities to revamp and lead a listless Congress party.
His much-vaunted political career has struggled since he left a job in London as a financial consultant to join the family trade, with a mixed record as an election strategist, a sense of political immaturity and a reputation for gaffes.
The teenage Rahul studied at the prestigious Doon School in the foothills of the Himalayas, following in his father's footsteps at the "Eton of the East" favoured by India's upper crust and boasting alumni across the political spectrum.
Home-schooled due to security fears after his grandmother was assassinated in 1984, Rahul was forced to abandon his studies at Harvard and take on a pseudonym at the University of Florida when his father was killed seven years later.
An member of the lower house of parliament since 2004, Rahul was elected to a seat that has been held by a Gandhi family member for 23 of the past 31 years, and unlike several
other young Congress lawmakers considered close to him, has never held a ministerial portfolio.
A Congress general secretary in charge of the party's youth and student wings, the beaming, fresh-faced Rahul features prominently on huge party hoardings and in publications, flanked by the wrinkled Singh and his proud, poised mother.
But in news conferences he often appears nervous and uncomfortable, and on stage at political rallies he lacks the charm and self-confidence of his mother -- crucial failings in a country where personality can often trump politics at the polls. |
E-mail
