As Rahul Gandhi's Jaitley Jibe Backfires, Will This Mark The End Of His 'Shoot-And Scoot' Politics?

Last Updated:August 02, 2025, 19:38 IST

It's been a week in Parliament marked by many controversies surrounding Rahul Gandhi

While Rahul Gandhi has every right to oppose and question the government, this shoot-and-scoot approach could get challenged as the BJP and others won't let him off. File pic/PTI

Dead men don’t talk. Which is why not many are willing to accept Rahul Gandhi’s claim that the late Arun Jaitley met him and “threatened" him on the farm laws. While Jaitley’s family and party reminded Rahul Gandhi that the union minister died in 2019 and the farm laws were passed in 2020, the big question now from critics is on the Congress leader: why always shoot and scoot?

It’s been a week in Parliament marked by many controversies surrounding Rahul Gandhi.

It began with his speech on Operation Sindoor where he accused the government of informing Pakistan and calling off the exercise under Donald Trump’s pressure. Then, it was his insistence that Prime Minister Narendra Modi call Trump “a liar", knowing very well that, diplomatically, it’s not a done thing.

Then there was his relentless attack on the Election Commission, which responded by saying he makes baseless accusations and refuses to respond to the EC’s invites.

He then stoked another controversy by agreeing with Trump that India was a “dead economy". In an embarrassment, his own party leaders, like Rajiv Shukla and Shashi Tharoor, contradicted him. While Rahul Gandhi has every right to oppose and question the government, this shoot-and-scoot approach could get challenged as the BJP and others won’t let him off. His mention of Jaitley evoked memories of when Rahul Gandhi had gone to meet the ailing former and late defence minister Manohar Parrikar in 2019 in Goa and claimed they had discussed the Rafale deal. Parrikar wrote that it was hurtful that Rahul Gandhi claimed they discussed Rafale when they had not.

A long time ago, a senior Congress leader who had mentored Rahul Gandhi on dealing with the media said, “It’s important for a neta to always be in the news." Known for his controversial comments, this eventually eroded his credibility. Does Rahul Gandhi run this risk too? Will his credibility be hurt?

There have been many instances when his claims and allegations have been questioned—like recently when he insisted and posted on social media that he knew the tariff deal with America would be good, as “we had agreed to a ceasefire as per Trump’s demands". But when the deal was fixed at 25%, this argument and prediction failed. The BJP hit out, saying Rahul Gandhi’s lies had been busted, and the same Trump whom he would want to call a liar was the one he trusted, even on the “dead economy" comment.

When he questioned the EC on the Maharashtra and Haryana polls, he forgot that the same agency conducted elections in Karnataka and Haryana, where the Congress had won. So now he has decided to take part in a protest on August 5 in Karnataka to talk about “EC irregularities" in the state’s panchayat polls.

In yet another embarrassment, his own party colleague Ashish Dua, who was co-in-charge for the Maharashtra polls, wrote in an article that they lost not because of the EC but because of a poor campaign and strategy.

The Congress projects Rahul Gandhi as an honest, well-meaning politician. No doubt, some of his crusades have gained traction. His “Samvidhan Khatre Mein Hai" campaign worked in the 2024 polls and shook the BJP. But while the BJP recovered and won polls, Rahul Gandhi seems to be moving from one gaffe to another.

This week has shaken Rahul Gandhi’s credibility. It certainly can be labelled as a week that wasn’t for the LoP.

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