Some say there is a leadership crisis in the country while others aver that there is a plethora of ‘electable’ (a word used in Pakistan) politicians who are our leaders. The truth precariously stands somewhere in between. As the current term of the Congress-led coalition comes to a close, the leadership battle is heating up. The heir apparent of the single largest party in the country today says, “The prime minister’s post is not my priority. I believe in long-term politics.” Rahul Gandhi has ruled himself out as the leader of the next government, if his party wins the 2014 elections. But as we have seen in the past, leaders can be ‘persuaded’ by persistent supporters to take up the mantle of leadership.u00a0

Rajiv Gandhi was thus anointed as prime minister on the death of his mother even though he had barely exhibited any leadership skills. Similarly, we have seen Deve Gowda, IK Gujral, Chandrashekar and Dr Manmohan Singh become prime ministers when not even they, let alone the people, expected them to be elevated to the job that Jawaharlal Nehru called “First Servant of the Indian people, pledged to their service and their betterment.” One year before elections, the names in the running for the 14th Prime Minister are Rahul Gandhi, Narendra Modi, Arun Jaitley, Sushma Swaraj, Nitish Kumar, Mayawati, Chidambaram, AK Antony and the one that never goes out of fashion: LK Advani, and one that may have run out of steam: Manmohan Singh.