Rahul-as-PM discussion can wait: Jayant Chaudhary

New Delhi: After Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav, it is now Rashtriya Lok Dal vice-president Jayant Chaudhary’s turn to stoke uncertainty over Congress president Rahul Gandhi emerging as the face of the proposed Opposition grand alliance.

Speaking exclusively to this newspaper, Mr Chaudhary asserted that the issue of Mr Gandhi leading the coalition was too premature and stressed on the importance of the regional players and coalition partners.

“Who will be the leader is not the issue rightnow,” he said. He also made it categorically clear that the country cannot be run by a single leader.

At the same time, Mr Chaudhary felt that Prime Minister Narendra Modi may prove to be a formidable rival as he remains a master strategist.

Questioned on the role he sees for the Congress in the larger Opposition alliance, the RLD leader conceded that though it can’t be predicted what direction politics ultimately takes, there was no doubt that the Congress is, as of, today the largest Opposition party in the Lok Sabha.

“There are states where it is the Congress that has to take on the BJP. So you can’t count it out. In UP also nothing has been formalised as of now,” he said.

Quietly side-stepping the issue of whether Congress president Rahul Gandhi was acceptable as a prime ministerial candidate, he said, right now the main Opposition plank is not who is the leader… All this is being played up to create fissures.

“Who will be the leader if not him, is not the issue right now. This country cannot be run by a single leader. This is a tall tale spun by the BJP and we want to puncture this narrative. So we are not talking of one leader in the Opposition. There are several people with enough experience who can contribute and we will all contribute together. There is no clash of egos,” said Mr Chaudhary.

Mr Chaudhary feels that Prime Minister Modi still has his finger on the pulse of a political campaign.

“He has built up an army of people to protect his image. He is very conscious about his own personal image. He decides which issue to wade into and which issues to stay quiet on. He won’t talk about Hapur or (US President Donald) Trump’s immigration policy. In politics that is a very strong mixture and I would not discount the fact that he has his finger on the political pulse of a campaign,” the RLD leader said.

“But I think the real issues are going to trump these things,” he added.

On his party’s stupendous victory in Kairana bypolls as part of an BSP-SP-RLD-Congress alliance he said, “Economics has trumped rhetoric”.

“We got very little time… perhaps that helped. Everyone understood the gravity of time shortage and put in a lot of efforts. Strategically I think that the right messaging went. We set the narrative. They (BJP) kept playing catch up and we set the tone,” said Mr Chaudhary.