Ceaseless attempts made by Rahul Gandhi whether camouflaging to become a responsible opposition or changing a look to appear mature and sincere in appearance backfire on him in particular and ultimately on the Congress in general. The ill-advised interaction with the media has been the recent one.

When Rahul Gandhi advised the government that lockdown is not the solution to contain coronavirus, the immediate reaction from BJP organizing secretary B L Santosh has been that why states, where his party is in power, extended it before the Central government did so. The credit attributed to Rahul Gandhi for the success of Bhilwada model by Sonia Gandhi was for what if not lockdown.

Social media has been abuzz that on what capacity Rahul Gandhi is addressing the media, he is not the party president for that matter he does not hold any office in the organization or leader of the opposition. He is not even a spokesperson designated. If as a Congress MP, he is addressing a press conference to keep the PM in the dock in the most distasteful manner, when will the turn of other MPs come?

The Congress Party has a history of questioning the prudence of the government of the day whether nuclear tests during A B Vajpayee government or surgical strike or Balakote attack or many more other decisions to the extent of mocking the PM. But this time round Santosh taking a swipe at Rahul Gandhi asked him why Maharashtra, where the Congress is part of the government, has backed lockdown, with the state dispensation extending it to April 30even before Prime Minister Narendra Modi's announcement on April 14 to stretch it nation-wide till May 3.

Rajasthan was among the first few states talking about extending lockdown with CM Ashok Gehlot being categorical on this. The Congress has its own government in Punjab and that too extended lockdown much before the PM made the announcement. It was in the public domain on the same day when the PM interacted with CMs of various states that most of them favored lockdown extension.

Rahul Gandhi strongly pitched for aggressively expanding coronavirus testing across the country and adopting it as a strategic instrument to defeat the pandemic. But people also question ignorance of the former Congress chief with countries of the world depending on each other for medicine and equipment so has been the case with India. Talking about utilizing the time to significantly bolster the existing medical infrastructure is misplaced when you are fighting for life-saving necessities.

The BJP supported India’s so far success story by putting out data to assert that India has managed to significantly contain Covid-19 as compared to other severely hit countries at just nine cases per one million of population and 0.3 deaths per one million population. On the other hand Rahul Gandhi’s attempt to corner the PM appeared to be more of a rhetoric devoid of facts. He must understand that time has changed and not even Gandhies will be taken seriously on their face value if they don’t have corroborative facts. Sooner he understands, the better for his elusive success!

(By Vinod Kumar Shukla)