In the midst of media reports about a move to make Rahul Gandhi, the scion of the Nehru-Gandhi family, the working president of India's ruling Congress party, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Saturday said if he was given any other responsibility, he will welcome it.
Replying to questions about the reports that Gandhi's responsibilities in the party might be enhanced and that he could be designated its working President, Singh told journalists accompanying him from Maldives that “this is a party matter…but if Rahul Gandhi is given any new responsibility, I will certainly welcome it”.
Singh had in the past invited Rahul to join his cabinet but the heir-apparent in Congress has so far been reluctant.
The Indian media has been abuzz in the last few days with reports that 41-year-old Rahul, seen by many as the future Prime Minister of India, is in line for getting a much bigger role in Congress than his present assignment of looking after just frontal organizations.
In recent months, Rahul has been drawn more into party affairs. He was made a member of the Congress “core committee” in August when his mother and party President Sonia Gandhi had gone abroad for a surgery for an unspecified ailment and he is taking the lead role in the party's charge to get back to power to India's largest state Uttar Pradesh where fresh assembly polls are due early next year.
Uttar Pradesh assembly election is being seen by political analysts as a test case for Rahul's leadership of Congress.
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