Rae Bareli has decided. They will settle for none other than Sonia Gandhi. Minutes after seeing her on TV announcing her resignation from Parliament, about 200 villagers of Sataon—around 40 kms from the district headquarters—assembled in the local block office and constituted two teams. One rushed to New Delhi to tell Sonia that they are proud of her. The other went to Rae Bareli to meet “Guruji” and ask about the next course of action.Gaya Prasad Shukla, 90, who was fondly called “Guruji” by Firoz Gandhi when he came here to contested elections in 1952 and then by Indira Gandhi, has decided to not to sleep tonight. “The people of Rae Bareli are very angry with the opposition parties. It will take the whole night to console them. They have to be told to keep patience and wait for the right moment to react,” he told The Indian Express.“You can see the thousands of young party workers who have assembled in the city. They need direction. I want to tell them that they should wait for the bypoll, when we’ll send back Sonia to Parliament with a thumping majority.” The people have already sent a fax message, congratulating her for giving a befitting reply to the opposition and proving once again that she has no lust for power. “We are concerned about her because she was looking very sad on the TV. We know she is too innocent in politics to understand the ill designs of the power brokers. We want to request her to give us voice in Parliament again and allow us to take care of the power brokers who hurt her,” said Suresh Dixit, one of the villagers of Sataon.Shahid-ul-Hussain, who looks after Sonia’s office in the constituency. said: “She is setting new standards in politics which will give direction to the aimless politicians of our country.”Another team of Congress workers from village Ludhwari—around 20 kms from Rae Bareli—have also decided to go Delhi to meet Sonia and request her to come back to her people. “You come to my village and see how many of us who were dying of hunger, now earn Rs 100 a day. She has given her work under various schemes of the government,” said one of the locals, Ram Swaroop. Uma Shankar Mishra, district president of the Congress, said there is a possibility that Priyanka or Rahul will visit Rae Bareli in a couple of days to spend some time with the people.
