Gurugram: It began in a paddy field at dawn and ended nearly three years later with food at a wedding in a farmer’s home, with tractor rides, a Delhi meeting, and a February invitation, in between—the kind of story that does not follow a script of politics.
On Tuesday, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi arrived at Madina village in Sonipat’s Gohana area around 10 am to attend the wedding of Tannu, the daughter of a small landholding farmer, Sanjay Malik.
It was on Malik’s personal invitation that Rahul had travelled all the way to the Haryana village. And, he was received with what he has since described as “parivaar waali mohabbat”, the warmth of family.
After the visit, Rahul wrote in a Facebook post, “Bahut aatmiya swaagat, parivaar waali mohabbat aur bahut hi swaadisht khaana, woh toh hona hi tha, annadata ke ghar ka bhoj jo tha (A very warm welcome, family-like love, and incredibly delicious food—it was bound to be that way, for it was a feast at the home of the provider).”
Further, he extended wishes to the newlyweds and congratulated Sanjay Malik and his family.
One for the books
On 8 July 2023, Rahul was travelling from Delhi to Himachal Pradesh in his convoy when, around 6.40 am, he noticed farmers bent over in their fields in the early light, transplanting paddy, in Madina village. The Congress leader stopped.
He rolled up his trousers, stepped into the mud, and spent the next two-and-a-half hours doing what most politicians would only do for the camera—he worked.
He planted paddy along with the farmers, got behind the wheel of a tractor to drive it through the fields, and finally sat down to have ‘churma’ and milk brought by the women workers.
Sanjay Malik was one of the farmers Rahul worked with that morning. It was the kind of unscripted moment that tends to stay with people—both the visitor and the visited.
After that day, Rahul did not simply move on. He invited the Malik family to his house in Delhi, where they visited him, and their acquaintance that began in a waterlogged field deepened into something personal.
Then, on February 25 this year, Sanjay Malik and his family made the trip to Delhi again, this time to formally invite Rahul to Tannu’s wedding. The invitation was accepted.
On Tuesday, Rahul kept his word, turning up for the Malik family’s special occasion.
His arrival at the village turned the wedding into one for the books—a story that Madina will pass on to the next generation. Rahul was received warmly by villagers, sat with the family, ate at the wedding, and blessed the newlyweds.
For Malik, a small farmer with barely one and a half acres of land in a district where agriculture remains the backbone but where a politician’s promise is often not kept, Rahul’s visit carried a weight that went beyond the ceremony.
(Edited by Madhurita Goswami)