In villages, people lunge to touch his feet and ring garlands of marigolds around his neck. He sends his security detail into a panic by launching himself into the open arms of the crowd. When an older woman is overcome at his arrival and swoons, he shrugs off the entourage to hold his own water bottle to her lips.
He is exceedingly fair of complexion, and wears blinding white kurta-pajamas: the two combine to give him a sort of glow, one that seems to mesmerize some of India's poorest citizens, for whom Rahul Gandhi is the self-appointed champion.
It is election season in India, and thus, Gandhi season. The world's largest democracy begins its multiphase electoral process next month, and so the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty is all over the front pages and the television screens every day, as it has been in every election since this country won independence in 1947.
But this time it is the scion who is gathering the most attention, as the storied Indian National Congress strives to brand him the hottest man in politics. Rahul Gandhi, 38, is the son of assassinated former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi and his Italian wife, Sonia, who has captained the party, with one title or another, since 1998.
A backbench member of parliament for the past five years, Gandhi is suddenly the smiling face on every Congress billboard, with the slogan, "On the foundations of the past, we will build a future" in an array of Indian languages.
Over the past few months, there has been feverish speculation that Gandhi would be tapped to take over as prime minister should India's congress dominate what is certain to be a new coalition government, although it is anyone's guess, at this point, whether the congress will win enough seats to head the coalition or even be part of it.
The congress is nevertheless spotlighting him in the campaign in the hopes he will draw the youth vote: One-quarter of India's 721 million registered voters are under age 25, but its politicians are generally two full generations older.
Yet while Gandhi has genuine popularity -- he is a passionate if somewhat awkward advocate for the poor -- some question whether he is qualified to run a country with challenges as large and diverse as India's.
"Before he is prime minister, he has to run a municipality first," is the withering assessment of M. J. Akbar, one of India's leading public intellectuals. Akbar knew Gandhi's father, and believes the son to be a fine, intelligent person.
However, "this country needs people in executive authority who can provide jobs, understand the economy and the complex social dynamic of the country -- hundreds of different things," Akbar said. He does not feel Mr. Gandhi's record to date indicates any such ability.
Gandhi worked for the business consultancy Monitor Group in London for three years before coming back to India, and ostensibly operates a computer business in Delhi that no one seems to know much about.
He holds a master's degree from Cambridge University, and an arts degree from a Florida college. He also attended Harvard for four years but left without a degree, because of security concerns following his father's assassination, according to Congress, although he continues to be dogged by rumors that he did not actually complete any of those degrees.
(Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service, www.scrippsnews.com.)
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