Rahul Gandhi's recent interviews indicate marked shift in Grand Old Party chief's personality

Rahul’s first full-fledged media interview in the ongoing general election with India Today reveals that the marked shift and a few years of leadership experience have transformed Rahul’s personality from an “impetuous, impatient and imprudent scion of the Nehru-Gandhi family into an intense, incisive and intrepid leader of the Grand Old Party”, reports India Today. In his 29 April interview, Rahul reacted to Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Naamdaar’ taunts stating, “that’s simplistic”. “Members of my family have been in politics, but their experience is not my experience. My experience has been of tremendous battles and violence. I’ve seen my father and grandmother get killed, I have seen elections being won and lost. How can you encapsulate my entire experience in one word? Understand me and judge me for what I am and what I do,” Rahul remarked. [caption id=“attachment_6528781” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] File image of Rahul Gandhi at a campaign rally. Twitter/@INCIndia[/caption] However, Rahul now stares at his biggest challenge as a leader and a do and die test for the Congress if it is to survive the political potpourri of India. The interviewers note that though Rahul is unwilling to speculate about a Congress victory in his interview, he is determined to see Modi and the BJP defeated. “I’m not seeing anything else,” he says in the interview. “Like Arjun, I’m seeing only the eye of the fish, and I’m going to hit that eye.” Rahul in the interview had revealed Congress’ game plan of having a two-pronged strategy. One of combating Modi with the Congress ideology and second of supporting liberal forces which are anti-BJP and allowing them to pose a third front challenge to the Modi government. Rahul wasn’t shy to admit to this in his interview. When asked to comment on his sister Priyanka’s remark that Congress has fielded “weak candidates” in Uttar Pradesh against the ‘mahagathbandhan’ to cut into BJP votes, Rahul admitted to favouring the SP-BSP alliance where they stand a strong chance in opposition top the Modi force. “It is pretty clear that in Uttar Pradesh, a secular formation is winning, whether it is the Samajwadi Party-Bahujan Samaj Party or Congress… I have told my sister and told Jyotir (Jyotiraditya Scindia) that our primary aim in Uttar Pradesh is to defeat the BJP… In places where we are not strong enough to win the elections, we will support the gathbandhan and the gathbandhan and Congress party are going to clean Uttar Pradesh up.” Rahul also revealed in the interview that the decision to not field Priyanka from Varanasi was made “long before” and he had promised to keep “the suspense” until Ajay Rai’s candidature was finally announced. He also countered allegations that he took the decision to contest from Wayanad as he was scared of the consequence of losing in Amethi, a Congress bastion, by rubbishing such reports and attributing his decision on the need to make South India feel " included" and to connect better with that part of India. All in all, in his interviews, including the one given to NDTV, Rahul has made his aim clear that he is here to challenge Modi and also laid out the Congress’ agenda of dolling out NYAY to people even as they go about gheraoing Modi on corruption in Rafale deal and his failed promises of employment generation.