The belief that a politician is still young at 60 may no longer hold good in India, as voters have elected 226 MPs who are less than 50 years of age for the 15th Lok Sabha.
May be it is the effect of the youth appeal of Rahul Gandhi or the induction of over 10 crore youth as the first time voters, the election saw as much as 40 per cent of the MPs below the age of 50 and the youngest one — Muhammed H Sayeed of Congress became eligible for contest just a year ago and is 26-year old.
The ruling Congress, ridiculed by BJP's star campaigner Narendra Modi as 'Budhiya' (old woman), has given 77 MPs who are less than 50 years and in the process defeated the BJP that had projected its 81-year-old leader L K Advani as its prime ministerial candidate.
Emerging as the principal opposition party, the BJP, which has secured 116 seats to the Lok Sabha, came second in terms of sending in MPs in the age group of 50.
But one just can't write off a politician only on the grounds of age, as the oldest MP to have been elected to the House is 88-year Ramsunder Das of JD(U), who emerged as a giant killer by defeating Union Cabinet Minister and LJP President Ram Vilas Paswan. Paswan had once held the record for winning with the highest margin of over 4.24 lakh votes.
Of this young brigade of 226 MPs, as many as 82 are below the age of 40. There are 147 MPs who belong to the veteran club of 60 plus years. But the presence of a large number of youngsters has given the hope that the new government led by 76-year-old Manmohan Singh, who is wishing to convince Rahul to be part of his Cabinet, would have a significant number of youth.