Anyone fantasising of Rahul Gandhi as PM doing best to keep Modi there: Akhtar to Khurshid

Days after veteran Congress leader Salman Khurshid seemingly proclaimed ex-party chief Rahul Gandhi as the 'once and future king of democracy,' veteran Bollywood screenwriter Javed Akhtar has given a rebuttal to the former Union Minister, terming his oxymoron as 'utterly pathetic'. In a short but unsparing tweet, Akhtar remarked that anyone who 'fantasizes' about the Gandhi scion as the Prime Minister is doing his 'best' to keep Prime Minister Narendra Modi in power 'forever'. While Akhtar maintained Rahul Gandhi can be 'acceptable' as one of the Opposition leaders, he shunned the argument for him to be anything more than that. 

Akhtar's no-nonsense tweet comes a couple of days after BJP national spokesperson Sambit Patra schooled Khurshid for proclaiming former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi and his son Rahul as the 'once and future king of democracy'. In response to Khurshid's odd proclamation, Patra had reminded the former MP that India is a democracy and not a dynasty. The BJP leader claimed that Khurshid has intricately pointed out the difference between dynasties and democracy. Patra highlighted that democracy does not have kings, as proclaimed by Khurshid, but instead dynasties have kings. 

In the same tweet, Sambit Patra also took a dig at Salman Khurshid for fanboying over the Gandhi family as he labelled the former Union Minister as a 'durbari' of the 'past kings and future clown princes'. Khurshid's remark came on the day marking Rajiv Gandhi's death anniversary. Rajiv Gandhi was assassinated by a suicide bomber on May 21, 1991, when he was at an election meeting at Sriperumbudur in Tamil Nadu. 

Rahul Gandhi's political career so far 

Rahul Gandhi, the former Congress chief who holds power as an MP of Kerala's Wayanad now, had lost Congress' bastion Amethi in the 2019 General Elections and has seen his party reach their electorally weakest point during his time at the helm. With Rahul Gandhi as the chief, Congress also suffered a drubbing in the previous Lok Sabha elections, with the Congress winning just 52 seats. The dismal performance also forced Rahul Gandhi's resignation as the party chief, and the party is yet to hold polls for the post, with Sonia Gandhi being appointed interim chief and remaining in the position for over 1.5 years now. Gandhi also campaigned extensively in the recently concluded Assembly Elections, with hopes of Congress being elected to power in some states. However, he inevitably tasted failure once against as the grand old party faced a drubbing in West Bengal, Assam, and Kerala - 3 out of the 4 states where elections were held in 2021. 

Congress defers party chief's elections, again 

Earlier this month, the Congress Working Committee (CWC) yet again deferred polls for the Congress President for the third time, thereby allowing Sonia Gandhi to continue as the interim party chief. The CWC which had huddled up virtually on May 10 to discuss the drubbing faced in recent assembly elections 'unanimously' decided to postpone elections for the party president citing the prevailing COVID-19 situation in the country. Addressing a press conference later in the day, AICC General Secretary KC Venugopal said that the party unanimously has adopted a resolution to defer the elections to early September.