26 Jul 2008

Rahul is no Obama
Rahul Gandhi’s speech in Parliament this week is now on YouTube and it deserves a second viewing. This column has never been a fan of either Rahul or his mysterious mum, but his speech wasn’t half bad, even if it was written by someone else. What some say — that the speech was shallow or unimpressive — misses the point. Rahul is being set up as a political person; he has to speak to the people, and so his speech has to be political rather than technical. If there is anything that Manmohan Singh should have taught us by now, it is that the democratic system needs seasoned politicians, not babudom-zealots whose definition of persuasion includes Amar Singh’s suitcases of 1000-rupee notes. Yet to say that Rahul is India’s Barack Obama, as some over-enthusiastic groupies have, is not just erroneous, but also makes one suspect that the groupies must also have received a wad of cash from the Samajwadi Party general secretary.  Full Story

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