Optics First

On the very day Prime Minister Narendra Modi completed 25 years in executive office, Opposition leader and Congress scion Rahul Gandhi offered his own political counter-programme: another impromptu sit-in, another confrontation with the police and another opportunity for the cameras. It was difficult not to see it as an attempt to steal some of Modi’s thunder.

The Opposition has alleged irregularities in the revision of electoral rolls and accused the Election Commission of bias. The ECI and the government have rejected those allegations. The issue itself is serious and deserves scrutiny. But the increasingly elaborate choreography surrounding Rahul Gandhi’s protests raises a more pointed question: is the objective to persuade the electorate, pressure an institution or simply manufacture an image of permanent confrontation?

The latest episode was hardly an isolated improvisation. In July, Rahul and Congress leaders turned up unexpectedly near the Prime Minister’s residence following student protests and demanded an FIR. A month later came another dramatic intervention at a police station over a student’s alleged pellet injury. Now comes the Akashvani Bhawan episode in form of a surprise dash on Gandhi’s part followed by an hours-long sit-in and eventual detention.

There is nothing inherently undemocratic about street protest. But there is a distinction between making an issue impossible to ignore and making oneself impossible to ignore.

Even Rahul’s INDIA bloc partners appear to have noticed that distinction. Reports suggest some allies were unhappy that what began as a joint Opposition protest increasingly came to resemble a Rahul Gandhi-led exercise, with questions also raised over the strategy and the demand to meet the Election Commission.

That is a revealing fault line. A political movement requires a coherent argument, institutional pressure and, above all, a credible proposition about what should happen next.

Rahul Gandhi may be trying to demonstrate that he is no longer merely the politician who speaks from the podium or posts on social media. He wants to be seen confronting power physically and visibly. That may energise his supporters. But political theatre has diminishing returns when the performance begins to overshadow the purpose.

Rahul Gandhi once seemed determined to establish himself as an alternative to Narendra Modi through speeches, parliamentary interventions and the politics of the road. He now appears equally invested in establishing himself as the politician willing to physically confront the state.

But politics is not a contest for the most arrestable photograph. If the allegation is “vote theft”, the burden is to establish the theft.The danger for Rahul Gandhi is that the spectacle eventually becomes bigger than the cause.

If the argument is that Indian democracy is being hollowed out, the Opposition needs an argument capable of surviving after the cameras leave. Because politics cannot forever be optics first.