“I love swimming in the sea when it's rough. It teaches you that rough is just another kind of calm.”
— Rahul Gandhi
India is in the middle of a political storm. Debates are raging across the country over the Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar and the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls.
Everything seems to be getting rough. Rahul Gandhi, apparently, decided to go ‘swimming’.
The Leader of the Opposition said he loves swimming in the sea when it is rough. To him, roughness is just another kind of calm. The Bodhi of the 21st century.
No mention of the Election Commission. No mention of SIR. No explanation.
Just the sea.
The timing, however, was interesting. But then, who said there was a perfect time to be poetic?
The internet, of course, noticed. Gandhi's post came amid a growing political row over the Election Commission’s revision of electoral rolls. A report by The Indian Express said Election Commissioners Sukhbir Singh Sandhu and Vivek Joshi had formally raised objections at least 14 times over 10 months to decisions they said were taken without their knowledge.
Gandhi has already been targeting the poll panel over what he calls “vote chori” and has stepped up his criticism of Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar.
After all, this is the same “vote chori” debate in which a Brazilian woman suddenly found herself starring in Indian electoral politics, despite, by her own account, having nothing to do with Indian elections.
So perhaps Rahul Gandhi’s rough-sea philosophy was not entirely out of context. When the electoral waters are this rough, even a Brazilian photograph can end up swimming in Haryana’s voter lists.
And across the country, there is a growing suspicion that something is not right with the ‘system’.
Then there is India’s obsession with the word ‘leak’. Votes leak. Question papers leak. Information leaks. Apparently, nothing stays where it is supposed to. Why?
And then there is Gandhi, in his state of ‘calm’.
Was it political philosophy, a warning or simply a man who really enjoys swimming?
We may never know.
Rahul Gandhi did not explain the post. He left us with the sea, the roughness and the calm. Perhaps he knows that politics is no child’s play.
When the political waters get rough, perhaps the best thing to do is not always to explain the storm. Sometimes, you just keep swimming.
Apparently, the well-wishers of democratic India are still alive.
Perhaps Rahul Gandhi knows something the rest of us don’t. Or perhaps he just likes rough seas.
Either way, while everyone else was busy discussing the storm, Rahul went swimming.
Election row: Getting rough.
Sea: Also rough.
Rahul: Enjoying the swim.
