Ten years ago, in a major embarrassment for Rahul Gandhi, the details about his educational background, as stated in the affidavit filed for his nomination as a Lok Sabha candidate from the Amethi constituency, turned out to be incorrect and misleading.
According to media reports, Rahul Gandhi had filed an affidavit for his nomination as a Lok Sabha candidate from the constituency of Amethi, traditionally a Congress stronghold. When asked about his education, he replied that he had pursued graduation from St. Stephen’s College in Delhi, apart from a stint at Rollins College in Florida, from where he graduated in 1994.
However, what grabbed the attention of the officials, as well as the local media, was the detail about his post graduate education. As per the affidavit, Rahul Gandhi claimed that he obtained a Master’s Degree in Philosophy from the prestigious Trinity College, affiliated to the world famous Cambridge University, in the year 1995. Rahul had obtained this degree under his famous pseudonym ‘Raul Vinci’. For those unaware, Rahul had adopted this name for security reasons, since his father, ex PM Rajiv Gandhi was assassinated by LTTE terrorists at Sriperambudur in Tamil Nadu, where he was campaigning for the Lok Sabha elections in 1991.
However, as per sources obtained from the university, it seems that not only did Rahul get the dates wrong; he also wrote the name of his course incorrectly. Rahul got 58 per cent in “National Economic Planning and Policy” which apparently was considered a pass in 1995 but was raised to 60 per cent before 2004. Following is a copy of the letter as published by the University, revealing his actual details:-
Interestingly, the letter had been issued in 2008 by Diana Kazemi, who was the secretary of the department of Development Studies, and not Development Economics, in which Rahul Gandhi claimed to have studied. According to the University, Rahul read for the MPhil in 2004-05, and not in 1994-95, as stated in his affidavit.
This revelation from 2009 raises a serious question on the intentions of the current President of the Indian National Congress. Only a couple of weeks ago, in a bid to corner PM Modi’s rising popularity, Rahul Gandhi, while addressing a rally at Imphal, took a leaf from the redundant jibes of Arvind Kejriwal’s over PM Modi’s educational qualifications. To quote an excerpt from his speech, “We still have not had access to PM’s university degree. Nobody actually knows whether the Prime Minister went to a university or not. There is an RTI filed in Delhi asking for PM’s university degree but it has not been responded to.”
This is clearly absurd, since BJP, led by party president Amit Shah, in an elaborate press conference in 2016, had revealed each and every detail about PM Modi’s educational qualifications, be it his graduation from the School of Open Learning at Delhi University or his post graduation from Gujarat University in Ahmedabad. So who is Rahul Gandhi trying to mislead here? Isn’t the very hypocrisy he claims to fight against in the upcoming elections?
If Rahul Gandhi is really a true blue liberal as he claims, he should come clean on these misleading details about his educational background. Else, we won’t be surprised if even his education turns out to be just as fake as his promises on loan waiver and minimum income guarantee.