What if Sonia Gandhi were to retire from politics
While Congress leaders said the party president would keep guiding them the way she does now, BJP leaders alleged it was a poll gimmick to garner sympathy votes.
Journalist-writer Rasheed Kidwai has said in his book '24 Akbar Road' that Sonia Gandhi stunned the Congress leadership last year when she expressed her desire to retire from politics in 2016.
According to Kidwai, the Congress president shared her mind with senior party colleagues on December 9, 2012, her 66th birthday.
"Stunned by the announcement - after all, hardly any Indian politician ever retires - nervous party leaders requested her to let Rahul 'take charge'," Kidwai writes.
"The prime minister conveyed to Rahul that his reluctance to be an effective power centre was hurting both the party and government. Rahul then agreed to opt for organisational work," the book says.
It was in this backdrop that Rahul Gandhi was made the Congress vice-president at the party's Jaipur 'Chintan Shivir' in January this year.
Senior Congress leader P.C. Chacko said he had not read any such book.
Ruling out any possibility of Sonia Gandhi's retirement, Chacko said she would keep guiding the party the way she is doing now.
At the same time, BJP's Syed Shahnawaz Hussain expressed concern that the Congress would be in tatters if this happens.
"Our political difference apart, we wish she remains at the helm in the Congress," he said.
Hussain, however, warned that if this was a political gimmick by the ruling party to garner sympathy votes, it would surely misfire.
Without getting into the veracity of Sonia Gandhi's retirement plans, let's take a quick look at the legacy she would leave if she were to retire soon.
(a) Having earned dubious sobriquets from the world media for his inability to take decisions, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh remains more miserable than ever. The latest to join the bandwagon of PM bashers is the UPA chairperson's taciturn son Rahul Gandhi. A self-goal was supposed to lift Rahul's self-esteem.
(b) Forty-three-year-old Rahul Gandhi has defied age and is still considered a political lightweight. Most recently, he was spotted in the political laboratory mixing "aeronautics" and Dalit upliftment. The concoction he made baffled the Congress leaders as much as the BJP ones.
(c) Infighting rules the roost in the Congress and many senior party leaders are known to not see eye to eye on many issues. If a hierarchy of Congress leaders in terms of political ranking is ever made, there will be at least 30 people on the number two slot.
(d) At the organisational level, the Congress is lacking immensely in many crucial states which has resulted in its poor performance in polls there. Uttar Pradesh is one such glaring example.
(e) The image of the party is perhaps at its all-time low. Corruption taints have caused massive dents into the party's 128-year-old history. It remains a Herculean task to build this image at the grassroots level all over again.
In such a dismal scenario, retirement is not an option for the party president. Instead, some renewed groundwork is the need of the hour.
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