By Aditya Aamir
If nobody has noticed so far, there’s something about Rahul Gandhi that has largely gone unnoticed. He is one of those individuals least “self-aware” among politicians. Bet the mirror is no great shakes for the Congress president. The stubble and the creased loose kurta-pyjama does give the casual impression of somebody consciously not making a sartorial statement. Sonia Gandhi’s son is at times also goofy, to the point of distraction. And, oftentimes, he throws in a word that submits to debate, discussion, bone of contention lost in translation.
The word this time: Submit! Asked what he thought of the Supreme Court ruling on Sabarimala, Rahul Gandhi replied straight-off that “personally”, he was entirely for gender-equality and gender-justice, completely with the idea that “women should be able to go where men can”, but because it was a very “emotional issue with both men and women in Kerala”, he “will submit” to the Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee’s decision to stand by the “faithful.”
Within 10 minutes of the statement, the AICC seconded the emotion and media in Kerala were all over its implications to the party and the state. For the second time in less than a week, a political party’s national president was deciphered by his words. Last week, BJP president Amit Shah was the frog in the laboratory, soon after he made landfall in Kannur and went on to test the Hindi of Malayalam-speaking television news anchors, many of who submitted to having got “lost in translation!’
Well, it seems Hindi alone is not the Achilles of television Malayalis. They also submit to blank stares when confronted with an occasional English word. Without sounding English-elitist, the submission can be made that Rahul Gandhi’s “submit” was scrutinized closer than the extraterrestrial in the movie ET on Tuesday night in Kerala where Malayalam is the common man’s lingua franca. And the interpretations were contrary and diverse.
In the politically-charged and religiously-gheraoed Kerala of today, “submit” acquired meanings from the ominous to the accepted! While one anchor took it that Rahul had capitulated to populist religious fervour against his convictions – Rahul’s status progressive and regressive at the same time – “probably” coming to the conclusion that Rahul surrendered after secret meetings with Sitaram Yechuri, another asked a Congress spokesperson if the Congress party was the “B-team of the BJP” in the state.
“Rahul Gandhi’s hold over the Congress is slipping,” imputed a print journalist, his hair grey with years on the Congress beat. Ever since September 28, the day the Supreme Court ruled that women of all ages had the fundamental right to pray at the feet of the Sabarimala Swami Ayyappa, the Congress has been in the piquant situation of being with the Ayyappa devotee and not against the Ayyappa-spurned women. While refusing to play communal politics on the issue, it wholeheartedly extended support to the “faithful.” But pitted against the aggressive Hindutva Ayyappans, the party was losing ground.
Now, with Rahul “throwing a spanner in the works,” state party leaders such as KPCC president Mullappally Ramachandran and Opposition leader Ramesh Chennithala are feeling handicapped and at a disadvantage to explain the dichotomy. “Which side of the aisle are you in?” is a question hard to answer after Rahul doing a Hamlet on them. With the temple door reopening for a day on November 5, the party will not be able to make many moves despite planning a series of events, special for the day.
The LDF government and the BJP-RSS on the other hand have their work cut out – one on the side of the law and “women’s rights”, the other firmly in the militant Hindu corner. The state government has one chance more before November 13, when the Supreme Court takes up a bunch of review petitions, to see a fertile woman devotee step up to the “18-steps” of the shrine. For Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan it’s a question of prestige. As many as 5,000 cops, including elite commandos, will swarm the Sannidanam and genuine Ayyappa devotees will be shooed out as soon as they are done with paying respect to Ayyappa.
Arrayed against the uniform are BJP-RSS and various Hindu outfits, ready to do Mahabharata at the Sannidanam, take on Pinarayi’s police and Pinarayi’s Red Volunteers with tantric-family discard Rahul Easwar – jailed twice and bailed out twice – leading the way with the walkie-talkie. The last time Rahul Easwar was at the Sannidanam, he was bundled in stinky tarpaulin and given a bumpy-ride out. Since then, the “brilliant idiot” has been like a limping limpet, quite like the Congress, which keeps getting asked the question: Who does the KPCC “submit” to, Rahul Gandhi or Rahul Easwar? (IPA Service)
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