Royal statements

Economists, philosophers, political scientists, politicians, retired civil servants and countless others have all along said that developing countries are short of capital, technology, institutions, governance etc. and that those are the major reasons for their backwardness. Few, if any""perhaps out of sheer politeness""have ever said that they are also short of leadership. But when one looks around, it turns out that if there is one thing that is critical in any country, developing or developed, it is the quality of leadership. China turned around only after Mao died. Singapore had the great Lee Kuan Yew. The UK came out of its 35-year-long economic decline in 1980 only because of Mrs Thatcher. The US finds itself in a hole now because of George W Bush. Under Jyoti Basu, West Bengal became a dump but under his successor, things are ever so much better. North Korea has not prospered, first, because Kim Il Sung like Mao was not a great peacetime leader and, second, because he wanted to found a dynasty. His son has been a disaster the likes of which are rare. Large swathes of Africa suffer because they have had no leaders at all, good or bad. These examples can be multiplied but the point ought to be clear: leadership is important and it is not an inherited trait.

The not-so-young-any-longer Rahul Gandhi should be judged in this context. His statements during the last two weeks""about how wonderful his family is""are probably the result of some very poor advice on how villagers recognise the Gandhi Superbrand but not the lesser Congress one. This may even be true to some minor extent. But, surely, Mr Gandhi also has an obligation and a right to think for himself. By repeatedly suggesting that but for his family""which like any other has had its good points and bad""India would have been very much worse off, he is not proving anything but his inability to think an issue through. That would not have mattered much if he had not, in the process, been insulting the intelligence of millions of Indians, too. This is not the place to point out the many mistakes the Family has made. But surely those who live in a glass house should at least not throw stones. Discretion is the better part of not just valour but also good leadership. Certainly, in a democracy, it doesn't consist of endorsing the dynastic principle.

Unmindful of this, not just the Congress party but also the Prime Minister has almost swooned in their admiration of their king-in-waiting. A spokesman of the party has said that what Mr Gandhi says is nothing but the historical truth. And the Prime Minister, perhaps temporarily forgetting""even after three years in the job""that he is not just a member of the Congress party but altogether something more important""the head of India's government""has called Mr Gandhi a messiah. That the Congress has for long been a royalist party is not in doubt. But even it, surely, has a duty not to appear foolish.