Rahul Gandhi’s answers reveal why his India Today decided to go with the print version

Rahul Gandhi’s fear of interviews is well known. Back in 2014, in his excitement for the upcoming elections, quite daringly he had decided to give an interview to Times Now Editor-in-Chief Arnab Goswami. Arnab proceeded to shatter what little image Rahul Gandhi had in front of the citizens by bombarding him with all kinds of questions including, the involvement of Congress in the 1984 riots, facing a difficult challenge from Narendra Modi, unaccounted Congress money and the various scams such as the 2G scam and CWG scam. To say that the interview was Rahul Gandhi’s worst nightmare would be an understatement. Thereafter, the Congress heir had never dared to give another interview to any journalist.

Nevertheless, a couple of days ago, Rahul Gandhi mustered up enough courage and decided to give an interview to India Today. The interview was supposed to be a video interview, to be aired on India Today TV.

However, the contents of the India Today interview were of such nature that the organization had decided not to air it on TV and instead released a print version of it. It isn’t clear if it was Rahul Gandhi who wanted the interview to be in the print format or India Today, but the fact is, the interview was allegedly scrapped off from TV.

It is being speculated that Rahul Gandhi had botched up the interview so badly that a TV version wasn’t possible. In a print interview, the flow of the content is uniform and important facial gestures and pauses, which are inherent to communication, are completely missed out. Moreover, it is possible to restrict the content being published. A careful reading of Rahul Gandhi’s print interview gives an insight into his answers and possibly answers the question as to why the TV version was allegedly shelved.

When asked about NYAY, Rahul Gandhi was dubious in his approach, more keen to show the places where the money wasn’t coming from rather than from where it was actually coming from. After his actual answer of generating the money from the present revenue systems, citizens are left wondering if 3.6 lakh crores of amounts is just lying around in government coffers and worse, has been misused due to government inefficiencies, including the time during the UPA era and even before that during the 60 years of Congress rule.

If his sister Priyanka Gandhi Vadra’s statement about Congress’ aim in UP wasn’t enough, Rahul Gandhi has come to explicitly state Congress’ role in UP, that is, being reduced to a party just meant to cut BJP votes, irrespective of Congress’ electoral victory.

When the interviewer asked him about his witness mantra, Rahul Gandhi for some strange reason twisted the question in a way that he came out claiming that he has ‘ripped PM Modi’s incorruptible image’. Whereas, the truth of the matter is, that that Supreme Court and CAG report have both given a clean chit to the NDA government on the Rafale deal. Nonetheless, Rahul Gandhi is keen on peddling lies in the interview.

The views on his mother being his sister and his sister being his mother are just strange. No one, let alone a national leader will make such meaningless statements in his right mind.

This is the Achilles heel of the grand old party – nepotism. Rahul Gandhi could not reply to the query of his sister being inducted into the party directly as a general secretary whereas the others have to toil hard to reach the position. Moreover, utilizing the ‘young energy’ of the youth isn’t a precedent in Congress as a lot of other youngsters weren’t given leadership opportunity until much later. Rahul Gandhi again became dubious and started talking about preferring ‘wisdom’ over ‘energy’; but his sister, who hasn’t been a part of Congress party ever strangely fulfilled his criteria of ‘wisdom’ before any other experienced leader.

The question wasn’t if he is going to be the PM, obviously, that depends on the voters; the question was if he is ready for the responsibility if the situation demands it. Rahul Gandhi’s hesitant answer, avoiding the question altogether indicates a lack of confidence. He is the PM candidate due to the dynastic preference of the Congress, other than that, as an individual, Rahul Gandhi is himself insecure over his ability for the post.

Rahul Gandhi’s answer has been an extension to what PM Modi along with the rest of the country is saying. His family member’s experience is not his experience. On his accord, Rahul Gandhi hasn’t done anything worthwhile to prove his ability to be a good leader.

This has been the most bizarre reply. The interviewer was probably trying to lighten the mood, to know about Rahul Gandhi’s personal interests. However, in that, the Congress heir inserted a philosophy so strange, which is in nowhere connected to a person’s eating habits; neither scientifically, nor spiritually. According to him, what seems appetizing to a person depends on how the mind chooses it to appear. If that was the case, why on earth would any person ever choose to dislike a food product on purpose? He is actually comparing food to people and views his like or dislike for them one and the same thing.

It is to be kept in mind that these are just excerpts published by India Today. No doubt, the actual TV interview would be filled with more abnormality and obscurity than what is visible here. In print interviews, the information flow is restricted and the interviewee is more in control over the flow of the interview than in a television interview. This is exactly what Rahul Gandhi took advantage of, and what the public now view as the “most in-depth interview of Rahul Gandhi”, is actually a carefully curated selection of answers that the Congress leader wanted the citizens to see.