Rahul Gandhi's message to Modi from Hamburg: You can't fight hate with hate, it would return with more force

By Buddhdev Pandya in London
President of the Indian National Congress Rahul Gandhi, addressing delegates from over 25 countries at the Bucerius Summer School in Hamburg, Germany, on Wednesday, August 22, spoke of Gandhian values, saying, if we respond to violence with violence it just can't produce solution; it would eventually come back. This was his generic message to world leaders, as well to those in the position of strenght in different capacities. He said, it is most important to 'listen to the people' if we are to tackle challenges of the 21st century.
Addressing a packed hall, and frankly answeing all questions -- including on his recent controversial hug of Prime Minister Narendra Modi -- Rahul Gandhi pointed out that responding hate with hate wouldn't help, since eventually it would come back with more anger and hate to society. This is the most noble and highly valued message given to us by Mahatma Gandhi, he said.
"It is very dangerous in the 21st century to exclude people," the Congress president told the Bucerius Summer School in Hamburg, where he was an alumnus in 2005, accusing the ruling BJP in India of "excluding tribals, Dalits and minorities from the development narrative.”
He added, “If you don't give people a vision in the 21st century, somebody else will. And that's the real risk of excluding a large number of people from the development process."
Answering a question on how to deal with violence, Rahul Gandhi spoke of Gandhian values, saying if we respond to violence with violence it just can't produce any solution, insisting, it eventually comes back. He emphasised, leaders of the world and powerful people must 'listen to the people' if we are to tackle challenges of the 21st century, or somewhere along the line the 'anger' and the 'hate' would take an ugly turn destroying the social fabric.

Rahul Gandhi's position is considered relevant to today's tense environment for those who, with some sense of political morality, seek to find 'intellectual' understanding of the situation in the world today. Soon after the speech, voices could be heard from the audience that the Congress president appeared to have gone beyond garlanding Mahatma Gandhi's statue or the picture of the late AB Vajpayee.
It may not be out of place here to recall that a section of top Indian diplomats share Rahul Gandhi's vision, especially for normalising India-Pakistan relations.
Thus, in March this year, speaking at the Lahore Chambers of Commerce and Industry (LCCI), Indian High Commissioner Ajay Bisaria said, “Both the countries need to shun violence and normalise relations in order to take the two-way trade to $30 billion from its present $5 billion." He asserted that there was no better way of improving bilateral relations than mutually beneficial economic ties, underlining, “Mutual relations between the two countries should be on the basis of trade and economy, and violence and war should not be an option.”
The view also went strong at the Bucerius Summer School that it is a “beggars’ belief” to suggest that, in this world of global connectivity, the international communities would not be aware of the situation in India. In modern times nothing can be hidden from journalists and researchers.

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