File photo of Yogendra Yadav

Rupashree Nanda CNN-News18

Updated on: November 29, 2017, 12:10 PM IST

November 29, 2017, 12:10 PM IST FOLLOW US ON: Facebook Twitter Instagram

New Delhi: Swaraj Abhiayan founder and ex-AAP member Yogendra Yadav on Tuesday said Rahul Gandhi has done as much to deserve becoming the next president of Congress party as Prince Charles has done to be the next king of Britain.

As a former psephologist and someone who has worked closely with the Congress scion, although briefly, Yadav said that Rahul is no match for Prime Minister Narendra Modi when it comes to the ability to communicate.


Asked if he ever saw Gandhi speak to young, old, middle classes, make a connect and bring them back to the Congress, Yadav said, "The requirement of being the leader of this country are almost impossibly high for any human being... you have to address a Mumbaiker, a Bangalore IT sector person...”.

“Modi’s worst critics, including people like me , must acknowledge that he is an exceptional communicator. But the proportion of fudge to my mind is more than required and he is caught very soon after that. But having said all that, he is an exceptional communicator”.


But it is not only Rahul. Yadav feels most Indian politicians would be no match for Modi. “Do remember, one has to communicate with someone from Bangalore IT sector to that woman in Odisha village who does not know whether there are prime ministers in this country. Your ability to communicate must be superhuman,” he said, adding there was only one person in the 20th century who did that - Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi.

“He had this exceptional ability to speak to a barrister and to that last woman sitting in a village - that is what is required".


Asked to clarify whether he was comparing Gandhiji’s skills to that of Modi’s, Yadav hastened to deny. “No no no. What I am saying is ofcourse, Gandhi for me is the model of communicaton. Modi is an exceptionally good communicator, but in the process also very deceptive unlike Gandhi".

Without mincing words in a scathing reading of Rahul Gandhi as a politician, Yadav said, “Does he have what the country needs today to take on the challenge to the very foundations of this republic? Does he have what it takes to galvanise people of this country to meet the bigger challenge and unfortunately? The answer is ‘no’.”

Yadav described the current state of the Congress party as “some kind of junk today”, “dead wood”, “burden of history” and “synonymous with corruption” and said the younger Gandhi has to reinvent the party for it to be taken seriously.

“It (Congress) is an obstacle in this country. It is a problem in this country. It is not a solution. So someone has to transform this party or junk it. That is the only option in history and Rahul Gandhi has to make up his mind whether he has to take up the road to transformation, take short term risks, go for the big transformation or go for quick fixes, and somehow let things be as they are.”

Asked whether it was not an irony that expectations from Gandhi should be so low, coming as he does from a family of many prime ministers, and especially when other young leaders like Jignesh Mewani, Hardik Patel , Kanhaiya Kumar have demonstrated their ability to communicate as well as tenacity, Yadav said, “These are the people who have risen from the ranks... who have gone from the bottom to some visibility. The kind of skills you pick up when u go up are entirely different kind than when you are picked up and parachuted to the top”.

“They (leaders) are there to give you vision and having made up your mind about vision, ability to convey it to ohers, communicate , get others on board and then to have tenacity and guts to insist. I do not know if Rahul Gandhi has that.”

Yadav did say that he found the Congress vice-president “more sincere” than most top politicians in the country that he has met.