Empty symbolism: When Rahul Gandhi paid Rs 1000 for a newspaper

Eleven-year-old Kaushal Shakya knocked on the right car window to peddle his newspapers – Rahul Gandhi’s. It happened when Rahul’s motorcade was stopped at a traffic light in Bhopal (Really? The Rahul motorcade stops for lights? And a newspaper vendor is allowed to get that close to the crown prince?) [caption id=“attachment_776921” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi. PTI[/caption] Anyway, Kaushal tried to sell Rahul the newspaper which had his picture splashed all over the front page. “Akbar leejye. Aap hi ki khabar hai (Please buy the paper. It’s news about you in it)” he told the Congress vice-president. Rahul asked him instead why he was not in school. Moved by the boy’s story about wanting to be a doctor but having to help out his family of five, Rahul offered him a 1000-rupee note. The boy demurred saying he had no change. “Please keep it,” Rahul told the boy. “Become a doctor. Never let your dreams die.” It’s an odd statement from a man whose own dreams seem so fuzzily and obstinately opaque even to the party that’s hitched its wagon to him. He is the posterchild for the man who is living someone else’s dream. The motorcade whizzed on after showering its noblesse oblige. But an enterprising state Congress chief decided not to let the story die. So they offered the boy’s father a regular job as a peon. Another Congress leader said “If Rahul_ji_ could give the boy Rs 1000 from his wallet, I would be delighted to fund his education.” Now he has been offered a monthly stipend of Rs 1000 and a seat in a private medical college after he finishes school. Sure, this is a far more preferable rich man’s motorcade story than the ones that mow down people sleeping on sidewalks. But as a feel-good story it sadly does little to add any real substance to Rahul’s image of the political dilettante. In fact, all it does, is confirm him as the master of the meaningless gesture. Note, it was not Rahul who came up with the stipend or the job. He just plucked out a Rs. 1000 note and went on his merry way. It just adds more fuel to the image of someone who appears vaguely well-meaning but has no particular vision of his own. The follow-through, if at all it happens, comes from the party leaders who bob in his wake. But the whole thing turns into a PR exercise for Rahul whether that’s what he intended or not. The rush to help the boy because he “moved” Rahul Gandhi betrays a party that remains hyper anxious to please their little baba despite all the inner-party democracy he is supposed to be building up. They give him all praise for a success in Karnataka and shield him from all blame in an Uttar Pradesh. You can be glad for Kaushal’s good fortune, but his story is no sadder than those of thousands of other children selling newspapers and peanuts and strawberries at traffic signals. If Rahul was moved by the plight to do something bigger for other children like Kaushal that would demonstrate a certain vision. Instead as usual, this boy risks becoming a symbol of empty promises just like the Dalit woman he once had dinner with. As a party that’s become too used to giving out handouts, Congress’ generosity becomes less a good deed than an act of casual charity. What’s the point of “reserving” a seat for an 11-year-old boy in a private medical college from now? What does that even mean? Why not help the boy with the ability to compete for that seat like everyone else instead of reserving it for him? Why not teach the boy to fish instead of just giving him a fish? Rahul seems aware of his own privilege but unwilling to do anything about it. He picks people at random at party meetings but does little more than listen to what they have to say. He talks about inner party democracy and the perils of sycophancy and dynasty but is unable to give his lumbering party any sense of alternate vision.He warns non-performing MLAs but doesn’t seem to extend that warning to himself. Whether he’s supervising seating arrangements at party meets to be more democratic or spending a night at a Dalit household, Rahul Gandhi does everything with maximum symbolism and minimum purpose. He makes the right noises in speeches to parliament or FICCI but all his much-anticipated speeches turn into an anti-climactic jumble of empty noise. He has proved over and over again he’s a walking talking anti-climax. Yet because he says so little, the media is picks over acts like this one in desperate search of larger meaning of the man who ticks behind that stubble. But here’s the newsflash. That’s all you get, folks. There’s nothing more there. In that sense that Rs 1000 note for a newspaper becomes unwittingly symbolic of the leader who can offer no change.