Jyotiraditya Scindia,one of the young ministers at the Centre,feels that the future of the youth is safe in the hands of Rahul Gandhi but does not want to enter into the debate whether he should take over as Prime Minister soon. Maintaining that the issue of Gandhi becoming PM is not something on which he can voice his opinion but only the party and he have to decide,the minister,however,sees "tremendous qualities" of leadership. "It is not some thing we can voice our opinion. It is something which both the party and individual have to decide," 40-year-old Scindia said. He was reacting to questions on the debate over Rahul Gandhi becoming Prime Minister and more so in the context of Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee's statement last week that Gandhi is Congress' future leader. "In him (Gandhi) we see tremendous qualities of leadership and leadership not only at the visionary level but also at the one to one level. The ability in a short span of time to analyse the problem and visualise the solution. All I can say that future of youth of the country is safer in his hands," Scindia said. He said that Gandhi was in many ways their leader,specifically for the paradigm that he has set and his ability to reach out to people. "His ability to stand through thick and thin with the economically weaker section,with the downtrodden,to take up the cause and fight for its logical conclusion. I think these all things that inspire a comparatively younger person like me as well," Scindia added. On Lokpal,the Minister of State for Commerce and Industries said he would back an ombudsman but does not feel that it will be "one stop solution" to check corruption. "I am for a very strong Lokpal. All of us are for strong Lokpal. But then it is not to say that Lokpal is going to be one stop solution for all corruption in this country. I think,we as individual citizen of the country also need to do our bit to be able to stop corruption," Scindia said. Describing corruption as "societal malaise",he said,"All of us would like stringent action to be taken against those who are culpable and I think only when fear of action is put into all of us that most of us will desist from such activities". "I don't think that solution is something (we can get) at a click of your finger. I think if you want a long term solution for this,it should not be top down,it should be bottom-up," he said. Scindia said the UPA government is in the process of drafting a strong and effective Lokpal based on the inputs given by a number of people including civil society groups. "We are committed that in the winter session of Parliament,we will be submitting the new draft of the strong Lokpal Bill," the Minister of State said. When asked about allegations of "governance paralysis" in UPA II as against its first tenure,he felt that perhaps "media focus on the negative factors" contributed to such an image. "I think the environment is what we make of. Some of the responsibility lie with all of you (media).. There are a lot of wonderful stories in our country but what sells,unfortunately,is the sensational. "There's a lot we have done and there's a lot we need to do. In many ways,there are a lot of wonderful stories. We need to broadcast those stories," he said.
