Rahul emerges — and the Oppn too

Five years ago, during a heated discussion in Parliament, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi went to the ruling benches and gave Prime Minister Modi a hug and a wink evoking amused smiles all around.

Not now - five years later as an aggressive Gandhi, energised by the fact that the Opposition alliance was now just 50-60 seats behind the ruling NDA, took on Mr Modi and the BJP led government head-on remarking that the BJP spreads hatred and such people are not Hindus.

The smiles on the ruling benches had been replaced with grim faces which was not surprising considering the bashing the NDA took in the polls as it saw its tally slide by more than 60 seats.

The two Bharat Jodo Yatras have obviously done the Congress leader a lot of good as he seems to have realised that political progress has to start from the grassroots. Soon, he set off to Hathras when the Yogi government was under heavy fire after a devastating stampede had left more than 120 people dead.

This even as the BJP’s national leaders waited and waited not realizing that people in the shocked UP town were looking for solace more than aid of any kind. And that was hardly forthcoming from the saffronists.

Days after that, Rahul was off to Manipur while the PM jetted away to faraway Russia turning a blind eye to a state which has been ‘split in the middle’ because of a raging ethnic conflict between two communities - the Kukis and the Meitis.

And as the PM engaged in parleys with President Putin, Rahul’s message from Imphal to him was clear and loud - Manipur was split in two and it was time for Mr Modi to visit the troubled state and hear their pain.

Have the BJP and its allies in the Central government not learnt any lessons from the poll drubbing in big states like UP and Maharashtra, which has left it short of a simple majority?

 Have even veteran leaders stopped listening to the people’s voices, so much needed for a political party to rise and meet aspirations in a democracy?

It is more than obvious that Rahul, in the space of five years, has learnt to listen, learn and imbibe much needed lessons to gauge the mood of the people and respond to their innermost aspirations.

And the BJP, like many other parties which tend to lose sight of their moorings after having being in power for more than 10 years, seems to be fast getting trapped in the quagmire of ill-founded optimism that the people will keep on forgiving them for their misdeeds and failings and keep voting for them all the time.

On Tuesday, Rahul was in his constituency Rae Bareli and Lucknow, where he met Kirti Chakra recipient Captain Anshuman Singh's mother, who urged the government not to divide the Army into two categories while lashing out at the controversial Agnipath scheme.

The issue pertains to the payment of compensation to the families of martyred Agniveers. So we now have a leader who has emerged as a fierce symbol of opposition to all that the BJP stands for.

He is virtually forcing all sections of society including the media to sit up and take note that India has an Opposition which is dictating the narrative and can challenge and counter the ruling combine at every step.

It is this vibrant combination of a ruling front which insists that it have its way all the time, and a determined opposition which will not allow anything beyond the winning post without a fight, which makes a great democracy like ours tick.

And we can be sure of many more spirited battles in the months and years to come for basic rights and for freedom, for noble causes and for the welfare of the oppressed and the poor.