DNA Exclusive: Rahul Gandhi, Congress politics, and his foreign trips!

New Delhi: The Congress party on Monday (December 28) celebrated its 136th Foundation Day, but Congress president Sonia Gandhi and former party chief Rahul Gandhi gave the event a miss. In a video message, Sonia Gandhi urged the party leaders and workers to unite in "fighting dictatorship" in the country and protecting its democracy, Constitution, and people.

Rahul Gandhi, however, is learned to have left for abroad on Sunday afternoon on a short personal visit and would be away for a few days. The party has not disclosed the location where he is travelling, but reports say that he has left for Milan in Italy. 

After facing criticism, the Congress came out with a statement that Rahul Gandhi has gone to meet an ailing relative and his grandmother and is not on a holiday. Congress chief spokesperson Randeep Surjewala said, "Rahul Gandhi has gone out on a short personal visit to meet up with an ailing relative, who is seriously sick. He has not gone out on a holiday. He also meets up with his maternal grandmother this time of the year, every year. I don't think the BJP should have objections to him visiting an ailing relative." 

Rahul Gandhi recently met the President and then made a statement in favour of agitating farmers. His enthusiastic support to the protesting farmers showed his political face but it was too short. The farmers' movement has already completed a month, and in these 33 days, Rahul Gandhi has made as many as 30 tweets on the issue. Congress leader Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, however, hit out at the Centre and demanded that the Union government should listen to protesting farmers and take back the new farm laws, but avoided media question on Rahul Gandhi's absence.

Former UK Prime Minister Winston Churchill once said, "Politics is not a game, it is a serious business." On contrary to it, Congress MP from Wayanad, Rahul Gandhi, has hardly shown his seriousness about politics, the reason, the country's oldest party has now been reduced to merely 52 seats, while it has ruled the nation for over 50 years.

This is not the first time that Rahul Gandhi has gone on a sudden holiday. Earlier in February this year, when the Congress government in Madhya Pradesh was facing trouble, Rahul Gandhi was abroad. When the party was contesting the recently concluded Bihar Assembly election, Rahul preferred to enjoy a holiday in Shimla. During assembly elections in Haryana and Maharashtra also in 2019, he was not visible on most of the occasions.

According to the information given in the Lok Sabha, Rahul Gandhi made 247 foreign trips from the year 2015 to November 2019. The former Congress chief, thus, made an average of 62 foreign trips every year, and about 5 times in a month he was away abroad.

On the occasion of the Congress party's 136th Foundation Day, we need to know that Mahatma Gandhi wanted to disband the party and transform it into a social service organization after independence, but leaders' greed for power turned it into a dynastic organisation. 

Notably, the Congress was founded by a British bureaucrat Allan Octavian Hume, who came to India from Scotland in 1849. When the first War of Independence was fought in 1857, Hume was an administrative officer or District Collector of Etawah in Uttar Pradesh. He laid the foundation of the Congress party in India in the year 1885. 

Its first session, which was held in the then Bombay province, was attended by 72 representatives, including AO Hume along with some British officials. Among other influential people were Dada Bhai Naoroji, Justice MG Ranade, Feroz Shah Mehta, and Badruddin Tyabji. It worked as a Safety Valve for the British Raj from the year 1885 to 1947, and its purpose was to eliminate the possibility of rebellion among common Indians.