Clever one-liners, acronyms, exaggerated accusations, stupid jokes and new challenges. We’ve seen it all. Narendra Modi and Rahul Gandhi have spoken a number of times against each other at this point, yet never directly debated each other.
Recently, Rahul Gandhi challenged PM Modi to a 15-minute debate with him before the Karnataka elections.
You might think it would be child’s play for Modi to accept this debate challenge. But no. Instead of accepting, Modi responded with an ‘I-am-just-too-cool’ statement.
“I’m kaamdaar, he is naamdaar. How can I debate him?” Modi quipped. “Instead, I challenge Rahul Gandhi to speak about the achievements of the Karnataka government for 15 minutes.”
With this, the issue of a debate was deflected once again, and his supporters mocked Rahul for days, till it faded from people’s memory.
But imagine the spectre of India’s most popular orator debating a politician who is popularly mocked as ‘Pappu’. India’s popular ‘tea seller-turned-Prime Minister’, who has four years of his governance to show off, debating a politician who has 60 years’ worth of dynasty baggage. Surely, it has the potential to bring impressive vote shifts towards the BJP in the Karnataka elections if Modi thrashes Rahul Gandhi in a debate? That would be a dream for his supporters.
It sounds all too easy, yet it is not happening. What is it that stops these two politicians from directly engaging one-on-one with each other on a public platform?
Let us get a reality check here.
Modi may be a good orator in monologues, but he is hilariously bad at any unscripted dialogue. ‘Real’ interviews already pose an unconquerable challenge for him, so much so that doing debates is absolutely unthinkable. And he is clever enough to realise that himself. The infamous Karan Thapar interview was enough to make him cry for water within five minutes. Another time, he spent a whole helicopter ride on maun vrat after a reporter asked him an uncomfortable question. These two instances were enough to make him realise that dialogues are too risky for PR and image-building. Especially, if you are bad at them. Since then, he hasn’t looked back, and is always extra careful about not making the same mistakes again.