Sonia Gandhi is the longest-serving president of the Congress party, which has governed India during most of its post-Independence decades. She was born in Italy, and educated at Cambridge University, where she met Rajiv Gandhi, who was then the son of prime minister Indira Gandhi. The two married in 1968.
After Rajiv Gandhi’s assassination in 1991, during campaigning for that year’s general elections, Sonia Gandhi initially stayed away from politics, but in 1998, she was chosen as the president of the Congress party. Under her leadership, in 2004, a Congress-led coalition came to power at the Centre. She famously declined to be prime minister — her foreign birth had become a politically controversial issue — and instead chose the economist Manmohan Singh. She was then named the chairperson of the coalition, which was called the United Progressive Alliance or the UPA.
Sonia Gandhi won her first Lok Sabha election in 1999, representing Amethi in Uttar Pradesh, a family stronghold. From 2004, she has represented Rae Bareli as an MP in the Lok Sabha. In 2024, she announced she was contesting elections from the Rajya Sabha, the indirectly elected house of Parliament, signalling her stepping back from electoral politics.
It would send a very reassuring message throughout the country if the honourable apex court took suo moto cognisance of how the Delhi Police conducted themselves in the sanctified space of the library in Jamia Millia library. Police forces are more politicised than the rest of the bureaucracy, feel their accountability does not extend to ordinary citizens. 2. As far as Shaheen Bagh is concerned, if an amicable via media can be found, that would be praiseworthy. Good that the Supreme Court has reiterated the absolute right of citizens to protest peacefully. Too much burden is being placed on the higher judiciary since the executive is not doing its share.
The party is an appendage to the family, whose interests come first and last. Like Prince Charles, RG can wait till he is a septuagenarian. Other Congressmen do not have the luxury of living off vast family estates. They want to return to power. Have ambition, ability, fire in the belly.