When American Democratic Congresswoman Zoe Lofgren had an embarrassing query, “Why does Trump’s picture show up in the word ‘idiot’ search results on the Google?”, Google CEO Sundar Pichai responded by explaining to the Congress how Google’s algorithm collates data from millions of web pages collected and stored to generate results for a term that is searched on its engine. In this context, it means that thousands of people have uploaded images of Trump with ‘idiot’ as a tag resulting in the disagreeable association. When a keyword is searched the images come up with those images that use the term as a Meta tag technically.
Similarly, the ruling party’s leaders, workers and committed bands of supporters ensured that even a Google search for the term ‘Pappu’ returned with the profile of Rahul Gandhi. Seemingly extending the mock-name for Rahul Gandhi since the 2014 parliamentary elections, the BJP politicians left no chance to squander in teasing him. It goes as a good or a bad taunt. It has no effect on him as he was said to have cleared it that he did not mind people calling him ‘Pappu’.
Politicians of all hues know and understand the sense popularised behind the term even if Sara Ali Khan would not be grasping the meaning of her oft-repeated word “Maa Ki Aankh”. However, the Congress Party’s one-year-old chief Rahul Gandhi, incidentally a scion of Nehru-Indira Gandhi lineage, is no longer a ‘Pappu’. He has been attacking the Prime Minister Narendra Modi by bringing the Rafael fighter jet deal scam to the forefront.
He seemed to have come under acutely tremendous pressure to do better than ‘Pappu’ in order to wrest his initiative as has resulted in three legislative assemblies’ polls. Had he been a declared novice in the country’s political arena, his party’s resurgence would not have been materialised. He appeared to have similar political tactics as Modi and Shah Company to revive people’s faith in his party. He raised farmers’ issues, youth’s issues, communal issues and other related issues for causing a dent in the BJP’s monopoly.
The BJP politicians considered him so because he was not well-versed in political nuances. Now, the emerging leader in him seemed to have understood the ways of democratic politics. For not only his party men but all and sundry would now be agreeing on his opinionated sagacity when he expressed that he had learnt a lot from Mr. Modi, particularly on what not to do in politics. However, he was quite thoughtfully making this avowal as if in a state of ecstasy following his grand slam success in the three assembly polls in the Hindi heartland.
Thus, he has put the maturity of his political notions before us. He lost the elections in the young state of Telangana because of freebies of the TRS government like the Raythu Bandhu Scheme providing an income of Rs. 8,000 irrespective of the farm size, free insurance for the tillers to the next of their kins Rs. 5 lakh on their sudden death, to 24 hours power supply in agricultural areas. Now, TRS plans to increase Kalyana Lakshmi grant up to Rs. 1 lakh from Rs. 50,000. The one-bed flat or two-bedroom house is not beyond the reach of the poor. Mothers on a delivery of male child receive Rs. 13,000, and Rs. 15,000 on a girl child at government hospitals. The state government bears the cost of education, housing, residence and food at government schools. It will also increase the reservation of minorities to 17% in education and jobs. Higher education and drinking water are also on the priority list.
He lost Mizoram because of the locals’ aspirations. What disturbs the BJP the most is Rahul Gandhi’s entry into the three main states, which is in no way digestible to the saffron party. He shattered the idea of Congress-free India through his re-emergence and here he looks like Mughal ruler Humayun who established his rule after several defeats by Shershah Suri. He stands here like his grandmother Indira Gandhi in his political will.
He now talks about the country’s politics like an older mind of Narendra Modi. He could trap him by his strategies in the coming parliamentary polls. He has shown his nearest political rival how he should behave like a mannered person now. The rival party must now be forced to ponder that Rahul Gandhi sheds his ‘Pappu’ image at an age of nearly fifty years and this tag is gradually packing off to the annals of snarky social media commentary. He is getting ready to move from the underdog to become an effective contender on the political horizon.