Kharge’s “Your Friends” Jab After Rahul Calls Out the Ones Who Walked Away
The other day at the Congress office in Delhi, Rahul Gandhi sat down with about sixty young workers from Youth Congress, NSUI and Seva Dal over tea. Priyanka Gandhi was there too, and so was party president Mallikarjun Kharge. These kids had been out on the streets lately, protesting against the Election Commission chief. One boy even had a plaster on his leg. Rahul looked at him and said it looked like a medal. Then the talk turned to people who left the party. Rahul didn’t hold back. He said the Congress is left with only real lions now—babbar sher. The greedy ones and the cowards have already gone. Some ran after bungalows and security cover, others ran because they got scared of ED and CBI. He named two people straight out—Jyotiraditya Scindia and Ghulam Nabi Azad. Kharge didn’t let that hang in the air for long. With a straight face he said, “They were all your friends.” The room broke into laughter. Rahul looked a bit awkward and turned towards his sister. “Priyanka is sitting right here. She knows Scindia was never my friend.” He then told a story from his childhood. He once asked his grandmother Indira Gandhi who her best friend was. She said she didn’t have one. When the young Rahul pointed to a woman who used to visit the house a lot, Indira told him, “I may be her best friend, but she is not mine.” Rahul used that to make his point. In politics, he said, the person who looks like a friend often isn’t, and the one who looks like an enemy may not be either. “I’m a political person. Figuring out who my real friends are is not easy for others.” Everyone in the room knew the background. Scindia had been close to Rahul for years. They were seen together often. In 2020 he walked out, took a bunch of MLAs with him in Madhya Pradesh, and joined the BJP. Now he’s a minister. Azad, a senior face from Jammu and Kashmir, left in 2022, wrote a book criticising the party, and started his own outfit. Rahul also held up Kharge as an example. The man had come close to becoming chief minister of Karnataka twice but never compromised on ideology. That, Rahul told the young workers, is what matters. The meeting wasn’t just about the past. Rahul told them to keep protesting, find new ways to raise their voice, and even go back to Jantar Mantar even if the government has taken it off the approved list. He claimed the Modi government has only eight to ten months left. This whole exchange shows how the Congress is trying to turn the exits of big names into a story of strength. By calling those who left cowards, Rahul is telling the remaining workers that the ones who stayed are the real fighters. Kharge’s one-liner keeps it light and human instead of sounding bitter. Party people say the tea meeting was mainly to lift the spirits of workers who have been getting detained and beaten up in recent protests. Rahul’s message was simple—the struggle itself is the training. Scindia and Azad haven’t reacted to these latest remarks yet. Both have hit out at the Congress and Rahul before. Inside the party the episode is being seen as another clear line being drawn between those who stayed and those who left. Kharge’s “your friends” line, said with a smile, softens it while still making the point stick. For the young workers sitting there the takeaway was clear. The party may have lost some big names, but the ones who remain, according to Rahul, are ready to fight. And Kharge made sure nobody forgot that some of those names once sat at the same table. Sources: NDTV reporting based on people present at the informal meeting; public record of Scindia’s 2020 exit and Azad’s 2022 departure. @Rohit Manral