Author: G. Parthasarathy
Publication: The Indian Express
Date: October 1, 2013
URL: http://www.indianexpress.com/news/like-father-unlike-son/1176647/0

When the hour came, Rajiv Gandhi was ready to accept the challenge. Rahul is yet to tell us where he stands on crucial issues.

Just as the articulate Ajay Maken was trying to explain the rationale for and merits of the controversial ordinance to amend the Representation of Peoples Act to a sceptical audience in New Delhi's Press Club on September 26, a highly charged Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi characteristically folded up his sleeves and launched a tirade against the ordinance. The ordinance had earlier been cleared by the Union cabinet headed by the prime minister and the Congress core group presided over by Sonia Gandhi. Rahul Gandhi proclaimed: "My opinion on the ordinance is that it is complete nonsense and it should be thrown out." This public outburst undermined the authority of the prime minister while he was on foreign soil and cast a shadow on Rahul Gandhi's own motivations. He had, after all, raised no objections on the issue earlier and evidently discovered that the decision was "nonsense" when faced with public outrage. Cabinet ministers, who had approved the ordinance earlier, enthusiastically extolled his qualities of head and heart.

Just over a quarter of a century ago on January 20, 1987, Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi announced in a press conference that he was removing his foreign secretary, A.P. Venkateswaran, from office. Venkateswaran immediately resigned. But, unlike the sycophantic Congress party politicians of today, the Indian Foreign Service Association passed a resolution deploring the circumstances under which the foreign secretary relinquished office, while expressing admiration for his personal and professional integrity. The resolution, which I joined in drafting, was made public after it was handed over to the prime minister. Venkateswaran refused to withdraw his resignation. When he privately met the prime minister later, he expressed his outrage at the manner of his ouster.

The Venkateswaran episode paradoxically increased the confidence that Rajiv Gandhi had in his diplomats, after he realised that they were professionals and not sycophantic men of straw. A year later, I was called by the prime minister to become his spokesman, despite my role in drafting the resolution of the IFS Association. But, as I look back on these incidents, I find several differences between Rajiv and Rahul Gandhi. Rajiv Gandhi was a reluctant entrant to politics, having started his professional life as an airlines pilot. He learnt how one functions in a structurally organised commercial organisation. He had a huge interest in the use of technology in national life. Even as prime minister, he continued logging hours in a cockpit to renew his flying licence. When the hour came, he was ready to accept the challenges of becoming prime minister, following his mother's tragic assassination.

Rajiv Gandhi distanced himself from the socialist rhetoric of the Indira Gandhi years. He liberalised the imports of technology and all but did away with industrial licensing. He thrust a reluctant bureaucracy into computerisation by personal example. He would have gone ahead with the introduction of foreign direct investment had he not been pushed on the defensive by the Bofors scandal, where there has never been any evidence to suggest the then prime minister's personal involvement. A payment routed to London did, however, establish the embarrassing involvement of a foreign businessman and wheeler-dealer. The Rajiv Gandhi years saw the highest growth rates since Independence, with industrial growth exceeding what it was in the post-liberalisation era. Moreover, a refreshingly new approach was adopted in areas like aerospace, communications, democratic decentralisation and rural water supply. The crucial decision to cross the nuclear threshold was taken in 1988. A little known fact is that the plans for the liberalisation of the Narasimha Rao years were drawn up when Rajiv Gandhi was in opposition and hoping to return to office.

Rahul Gandhi is yet to enlighten us on where he stands on crucial issues of public interest. Apart from references to his heart beating for the poor and tribals and his interest in a clean environment, people in India have no idea what his thinking is on the crucial economic and security challenges the country faces. His only publicly available views on terrorism are that he regards "Hindu terrorism" as the greatest threat India faces. One did not expect to see the day when an aspiring national leader would equate terrorism with a particular religion.

We are still to hear from Rahul Gandhi how he thinks the country should deal with back-breaking inflation, and how he intends to match his desire for virtually unlimited funding of populist programmes, whose cost-effectiveness is questionable, with the limited budgetary resources available. Even on corruption, all that we have heard from the young Congress leader is what he read from a prepared text in an extended debate on the Lokpal bill. Has he done anything since then to get legislation on the Lokpal enacted? Moreover, does he favour economic liberalisation and rapid growth like we have witnessed in our eastern neighbourhood, or does he want a return to the growth rates of the "licence, permit, quota raj'' of the 1970s?

Unlike his father, Rahul Gandhi does not aspire for the office of prime minister and would evidently like a continuation of the status quo, where the party boss has all powers but no constitutional responsibility, whereas the prime minister becomes a figurehead having constitutional responsibility but virtually no powers, especially in the crucial areas of hiring, firing, overruling and ordering minsters and other high functionaries. We have seen the disastrous effect of such a structure in the years of UPA 2. A person of the integrity and intellectual abilities of Manmohan Singh has been made a prime minister who cannot discipline, or fire, his ministers on corruption. Crucial sectors like communications, infrastructure, power and coal, consequently lie in the doldrums.

Given his upbringing and familiarity with the way the power structure in India functions, Rahul Gandhi could well have all the attributes needed to be a successful national leader. But, for this, he should be ready to accept the constitutional responsibilities of national governance and spell out where he stands on pressing national issues in areas like economic development and national security.