Religion Doesn’t Matter for PM’s Rank, A Capable Muslim Can Be One: Rahul

Congress general secretary Rahul Gandhi has said that religion doesn’t matter when it comes to the prime minister and a Muslim can get the top job provided he is the most capable person for it.

“It is not about what religion or community you come from, it is what you bring to the table, what capability you have,” he said while interacting with students of the Aligarh Muslim University.

He gave this statement while responding to a query that having come a long way after Independence, how much more time will it take for India to have its first Muslim prime minister.

“Today, Manmohan Singh is not the Prime Minister of India because he is a Sikh. He is the Prime Minister because he is the most capable person to do the job.

“And let me tell you something that even when you do have a Muslim prime minister, he will be a prime minister because he is the most capable person,” the Congress general secretary said.

Responding to another query, he said: “You need to step up and the number of leaders coming out of your community needs to go up. You got today a Sikh prime minister that nobody would have ever imagined in a country of over a billion people that we would have a Sikh prime minister. Sikhs are a very small percentage of this country.”

Gandhi said that he was trying to involve people from different communities and from different parts of India in the political system.

He urged Muslim youths to participate in national politics in a big way.

“Increased participation of Muslim youths is the ideal way to take on problems not only of the Muslim community but the country as a whole,” he said.

Gandhi noted that the lack of an active young Muslim leader in the country at present in national politics is something very unfortunate.