A chorus of clucks
You don’t say!
Darius Nakhoonwala
Nothing pleases leader writers more than a chance to cluck disapprovingly. All the better if the clucking is over something that politicians have done or said. And this general election has provided them many opportunities for a chorus of clucks, the latest being the throwing of verbal sulphuric acid at each other by Priyanka Gandhi (which one faction of the Congress supports over her civilised brother) and the Saffron crowd led by its paramacharya Narendra Modi.
The Indian Express got it wrong. It talked about Priyanka as a politician. “…Priyanka Gandhi’s stepped up personal investment towards the end of this election… has also ensured that, in the final reckoning, at the end of an extremely personalised campaign, the spotlight is on Narendra Modi versus the Congress’s first family…Priyanka Gandhi is clearly a public speaking asset…She has not hesitated to go for the jugular, or to wade into the muck… At the same time, she has also been the source of one of the party’s big embarrassments, after details of her husband Robert Vadra’s phenomenal luck with land transactions… (but) she is a compelling player… Her presence is also a reminder that, at least in the foreseeable future, the family cannot be taken out of the party any more than the party can be taken out of the family.”
The Telegraph chose to talk down to the reader. Sample this: “There are individuals and there are issues. On some occasions there is an overlap between an individual and an issue. It is not unfair to assume that in a mature democracy, when an election is fought, the emphasis should fall more on issues than on individuals.” Ouch! It went on “Most of Mr Modi’s speeches are aimed at attacking his opponents, and most of his opponents’ speeches are either counter-attacks or defensive moves. Issues fall through the trapdoor of rhetoric.”
Then it turned to Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, of whom it said “it is not the fortune of the Congress that has made her come out to speak to the voters… she wants to ensure the victories of her closest of kin… But her utterances have brought back attention to the business dealings of her husband, Robert Vadra… In her noble attempt to stand by her mother and her brother, Ms Gandhi Vadra may have opened up her flanks to attacks — and the attacks are by no means unexpected. The inability to answer the charges being levelled against Mr Vadra could well be the coup de grace to a languishing party.”
The Business Standard, whose long-winded edits now bore readers as much as its dowdy design makes them look away, made the only points that were worth making. “Ms Gandhi's emotional response to the accusations against her husband - that she is hurt, and that she doesn't know what to tell the children - is rightly seen as an evasion. Such a response is hardly adequate and she should explain with credible evidence if her husband is not guilty of the charges levelled against him.” It added that “the Congress' "saviour", as some are seeing Ms Gandhi, seems to have less substance than the existing heir... the renewed prominence of Priyanka Gandhi means the party and its leaders cannot avoid the strong whiff of disrepute attached to his dealings. The country will expect a clearer explanation of why Mr Vadra chose to make his deals and what he knew; as well as a promise of a full, transparent investigation into possible collusion by government servants.”
Mint said much the same thing. "Priyanka may well go on to prove herself at some point in the future but so far she has shown none of those skills or even the appetite for taking on responsibility. A few barbs at a political opponent in a fractious election are the scare that a Puffer Fish induces...Defence of family cannot be a poll strategy or a substitute for a muscular structural policy for the Indian polity. At best it can be a sentimental sotto voce aside for an empty, thoughtless decadal nation-building record."