Sambit Patra is national spokesperson for the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and a renowned surgeon.Both the son and the son-in-law of Smt. Sonia Gandhi have done to the Congress what its worst enemies have not succeeded in doing to them. While son Rahul Gandhi has embarrassed the Congress by his multiple acts of omissions, son-in -law Robert Vadra has discomforted the Congress by several wrongful commissions. On Saturday, November 1, while newsmakers were calling it a day at 10 pm, the attention of the country was caught by the misadventures of a gymming Robert Vadra.
The shoving of the mike, the repeated utterances of the word "Are you serious?" and "nuts" and an order to security personnel by Mr Vadra to delete the embarrassing video presents a lot to decipher. A mere cursory glance at Saturday night's incident gives meaningful insight about the psychology of its main player - a classic case of "Monarchial High Headedness".
Though a democratic country, power has remained vested with a few families in India: it's only human that the members of these families considers themselves as monarchs of India. What happened at a gym at Delhi's Ashoka Hotel is a subtle manifestation of this thought process.
When confronted with an uncomfortable question, Robert Vadra who was otherwise comfortable till then, gets agitated and repeats "Are you serious?" multiple times. It implies - Are you really asking me this question? Are you seriously asking this question to Me? Don't you know who I am? No one has as yet dared to question me. How dare you?
The same Mr. Vadra who a year ago had called India a "Banana Republic" and dubbed Indians "mango people" calls the ANI reporter "nuts" (a fruity trail indeed) -this only reflects that Mr. Vadra considers himself standing on a pedestal high enough where anyone who questions his actions is branded as an idiot! Then he commands his security personnel to see it that the video is deleted before the reporters are let off. The sense of entitlement over the security guards is classically reflective of monarchial mannerisms. The security blanket is supposed to do all that it can for the physical safety of Mr. Vadra; in no way are they supposed to take orders of Robert Vadra to ensure his "character's safety". That lies entirely vested with Mr Vadra himself.
Mr Vadra's arrogance has so long been a matter of disgust and discussion that he doesn't disturb us anymore. We have got used to it. But the way Congress appeared confused on the whole issue was amusing in itself. Majority of the Congress leaders defended and spoke for Mr Vadra. Those defending Vadra painted him as a "private citizen" and the media as a hounding "paparazzi". Both excuses vaporize with the fire of logic. Now a party where "The Family is the Party" can't hide behind the plea that any member of "the family" is outside the realm of the Congress. By the way, you may or may not be a member of the Congress but there is nothing called as a "Private Citizen"; any one misappropriating public money because of his proximity to a political party is bound to be questioned.
As far as the "Paparazzi" excuse is concerned, it is important to know that the press invite for the event in question was sent out by the PR agency of Mr Vadra. Moreover, Mr Vadra was happily interacting with the same reporter till the time the uncomfortable question was not asked. Neither was he hounded nor was he followed. Rather the media reporter was hounded and detained by the security personnel. Mr Vadra had the option of refraining from answering the question posed to him by simply saying "No Comments" as is normal in the political world. But apparently Mr Vadra's sense of entitlement prevented him from exercising this right.
It doesn't take rocket science to realize that Congress has stumbled in its handling of the whole issue, and that's because the truth is very evident. As was destined, the embarrassing video could not be deleted inspite of the effort put in by Mr Vadra, but if such be his efforts, the days is not far when Congress' political future stands exposed to the danger of deletion.
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