SHAKY STRONGHOLD

Rahul Gandhi faces a tough battle in Rae Bareli, where he locks horns with local strongman Dinesh Pratap Singh of the BJP

- PUJA AWASTHI

For every boundary that is breached in politics, there is a homecoming; for every leap into the unknown, a fallback into the comfort of the old.

It is the memory of that solace that seeps through the faded yellow brick walls and latches onto the brown doors that run around a large courtyard at Guruji ka Ghar.

Guruji, so addressed by Indira Gandhi, was Pandit Gaya Prasad Shukla, a freedom fighter. It was he who had first written an opinion piece in Navjivan—the newspaper founded by Mahatma Gandhi—on why Indira must contest from Rae Bareli. In 1930, when she made her maiden visit to the district, she was 12 and everyone called her Indu.

That rented house, with its large front yard marked by a furrowed, leafy neem tree, would go on to become the hub of Congress politics (and the designated central Congress office). The terrace was the venue for meetings. In the kitchen, leaders like Sheila Kaul helped Shukla’s daughter-in-law roll out chapatis or chop vegetables.

Guruji is no more. His son Jagdish Narayan passed away a year ago. Yet, on May 3, led by Preeti Shukla, the 73-year-old daughter-in-law of Guruji, the family organised the havan and puja that is mandatory before a member of the Gandhi family files the nomination.

After the puja, Preeti Shukla dropped into one end of the sari palla of both Sonia Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra the traditional offerings of rice, jaggery and turmeric (locally called a koncha) and gave every family member some money as blessings. “My father-in-law had first asked me to do it for Indira ji, who he called bhauji (sister-in-law),” she said. “It is like Sudama’s offering, but they have always received it with respect. What more do we want.”