Scripted or not, Rahul embracing Modi has become the most talked about moment, and could become his election campaign trademark
The hug bothered Modi so much that he went out to Shahjahanpur, UP, for a Kisan rally and accused Rahul of an ambush
The no-confidence motion in Parliament that Prime Minister Narendra Modi won on Friday is now famous for just one thing: Congress President Rahul Gandhi's hug. It is the most talked about thing, more than Modi's own interminable and stale speech; more than Speaker Sumitra Mahajan's schoolmarmishness, in which she outdid her predecessor Meira Kumar; more than Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman's weak defence of the Rafale purchase, which now increasingly resembles the days of Bofors in the 1980s, when Congress ministers popped up from their seats not to defend the government but to defend their PM.
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The photo of the hug featured on the front pages, and it bothered Modi so much that he went out to Shahjahanpur, UP, for a Kisan rally and accused Rahul of an ambush: "gale pad gaye". His Twitter team was hyperactive with its usual mix of bluster and untruths, desperate to snatch back control of the narrative. Modi cheerleaders half-heartedly decried Rahul's "theatrics"; one even ill-advisedly went on TV and said the Great Leader's speech had "lynched" the Opposition. An unfortunate choice of words. It is a telling contrast: be hugged, or be lynched. World leaders must worry what lies in store for them the next time they meet Modi. (Well, not Chinese President Xi Jinping, who spent a weekend in Wuhan with Modi, but did not give a single hug.)
Rahul's hug, awkward though it was because of Modi's refusal to play along, gave us a visual motif of the next parliamentary election. Modi, the leader of lynchers (and those who garland the lynchers), versus Rahul the embracer. Hatred versus affection. Vindictiveness versus forgiveness. Exclusion versus inclusion. A scowl versus a grin. A cantankerous old geezer versus a 'bro'. If Modi spent the past four years darkening the national mood — to the delight of his admirers who mistake it for a down-to-business attitude — then Rahul lightened it.
Mahajan panicked and called the hug "unparliamentary", against decorum. Though she is a nine-term parliamentarian, she has proved herself to be a nine-time zombie, lacking in political dignity and replaceable by any of the BJP's tweedledees and tweedledums. She could have shown subtlety: defending the Great Leader is best served with the veneer of convention and precedent. In a country where legislators routinely run to the 'well' of the House to disrupt proceedings, snatch papers from ministers, or just shout each other down, to say that a hug is against decorum is puzzling.
Others dismissed the hug as "scripted". News reports claim that some Congressmen were taken aback, including UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi. Perhaps his close advisors suggested Rahul keep the "hug" in his quiver; he may have been advised to gauge the mood and if the moment seemed right, to use it. Possibly the hug is a distillation of a comprehensive policy that distinguishes him from Modi; it may even represent the party's socio-political manifesto. Rahul in his speech apparently did not once use the word "secularism". With the hug, he need not. But even if the hug is scripted, then more power to the scriptwriters. They've shown more creativity in this singular moment than has either discarded finance minister Arun Jaitley or acting finance minister Piyush Goel.
Rahul might also be accused of not being in sync with the zeitgeist. After all, two men hugging is such a 1970s Bollywood thing. I've been watching Sacred Games and I'm struck by how much sweaty sex it depicts, but how few hugs. In Delhi, people don't full-on embrace, but instead perform an oddity that was maybe invented and perfected by Punjabi auntyjis: the sideways hug. More awkward than the Rahul-Modi hug, in it you wrap one arm around your victim's shoulder and stick your sides together. It feels stupid. Also, it conditions you against the hug that is de rigeur in America, the full-on embrace. It is telling that former US President Barack Obama used to hug everyone he met, but his successor Donald Trump, the germophobe, is so unused to intimacy that when he tried to hug the former Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) director, James Comey, it looked as if he had kissed Comey. The Europeans do the both-cheeks air-kiss but Rahul might want to avoid that with Modi.
When Rahul goes on the campaign trail, I hope he takes the time to hug some of his potential voters. Modi will never do so; he has led a rarified existence the past four years and has formed an impenetrable bubble around himself, guarded by the SPG. For him, to say "bhaiyon-behenon" is enough. Modi has forgotten that in elections around the world, what makes the difference is personal touch. If Rahul can, like Mata Amritanandamayi, make hugging his trademark, then his success is in his own hands, literally and metaphorically.
Aditya Sinha's latest book, The Spy Chronicles: RAW, ISI and the Illusion of Peace, co-written with AS Dulat and Asad Durrani, is now available. He tweets @autumnshade Send your feedback to mailbag@mid-day.com
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