Had overuse and skewed nationalism not reduced the term ‘sedition’ to hollow political invective, Rahul Gandhi would be tottering on the brink of grave criminality by attempting to exploit the sentiments of workers in a key defence-production establishment. Maturity and responsibility have never been strong points with the president of the Congress party, but have those qualities also deserted the more sagacious and experienced leaders of the party? Or have they, like their counterparts across the aisle reconciled themselves to being bit-layers in a one-man show?

The Rafale deal is far from pristine, there are avenues available for fighting a political battle, but a degree of hapless desperation is evident from Rahul’s display at Minsk Square in Bengaluru. Had he looked across the street to the mock-up of a Tejas LCA and true patriotism run in his veins he might have implored Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd. to expedite the development/production of the indigenous fighter. Confusion is characteristic of the man.

Accidentally, or deliberately critics would insist, he contrasts one aspect of the Rafale deal which the UPA failed to conclude despite years of negotiation with the unsatisfactory arrangement that the NDA now struggles to defend. And mischievously misleads the rank and file of the HAL workforce that they had been “robbed” to favour a pet private firm. It would certainly benefit the raging debate if Nirmala Sitharaman shed her fetish for secrecy and disclosed details of the offsets arrangement, what items were to be produced/supplied by the Ambanis, what was their money-value, how many of them are produced by the deprived PSU?

The selective memory of the Congress president was also manifest in his tirade near the GPO. He quoted his great-grandfather about the “temples of modern India” but forgot that it was his father who triggered the liberalising of the Indian economy. And conveniently overlooked the fact that it was the exhortation to disobey “illegal orders” that served as a fig-life to camouflage his grandmother’s self-serving Emergency: was inciting HAL workers very different? Maybe there is a difference, his call would not be comparable with Jayaprakash Narayan’s in New Delhi in June 1975 ~ not many take Rahul seriously.

Only in the Krishna Menon era would Rahul’s advocacy of HAL have been appreciated. This is not the occasion for a critical evaluation of the defence PSU’s track-record but when the original Rafale deal fell through, the “buzz” was that Dassault was reluctant to guarantee the cost/time schedules of the HAL-built products.

HAL’s Marut (HF-24) development was such a flop that Rajiv scrapped it prematurely, and its jet trainer remains a distant dream. Its joint-production of the HS-748 and MiG-21 tell a disappointing tale. Even its modernisation projects are missing deadlines. A chat at the bar with IAF fly-boys might help Rahul get a true picture of the organisation he has just praised sky-high ~ for nothing more than the narrowest of political purposes.