Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla on June 26 officially recognised Rahul Gandhi as the Leader of the Opposition, following the Congress party’s formal communication of his nomination to the Lok Sabha Secretariat a day earlier. A notification issued by the Lok Sabha Secretariat confirmed that Rahul has been acknowledged as the Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha effective from June 9. Notably, this is the first time after a gap of ten years that there will be a leader of opposition in the Lower House, as the Congress or other opposition parties did not have the 10 per cent members required to claim the post in the 16th and the 17th Lok Sabha. In the current 18th Lok Sabha, Congress has 99 members.
Though Rahul had been a vice president and later president of the Congress from 2027 to 2019, he never held a constitutional post in his career as a parliamentarian. Rahul, who turned 54 last week, has been an MP for five terms. He first entered the Lok Sabha in 2004 from Amethi in Uttar Pradesh and represented the family bastion till 2019 when he lost the seat but was elected from the Wayanad seat in Kerala. In the 2024 Lok Sabha polls he got elected from both Rae Bareli and Wayanad but kept Rae Bareli to focus on his home state of Uttar Pradesh. Rahul’s return to the Lok Sabha and his elevation to the opposition’s leadership come after his brief disqualification last year due to a defamation conviction.
The BJP leaders used to target Rahul by saying that he was a reluctant politician and avoiding taking responsibility. The BJP and Prime Minister Narendra Modi have often ridiculed Rahul all these years. But he shattered that negative image during the two nationwide marches and later when he led the Congress in the 2024 Lok Sabha election. Now all eyes are on him to prove if he is an effective and strong Leader of Opposition to keep the government on its toes. Rahul becoming the Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha would set the narrative and send a political signal to Uttar Pradesh, the state which sends 80 MPs to the House.
With his appointment as Leader of Opposition, Rahul will now lead the INDIA bloc from the front to corner the NDA government both inside and outside the Parliament. Moreover, Rahul will be a member of crucial parliamentary committees which included several Joint Parliamentary Committees, the committees of Public Accounts, Public Undertakings, Estimates, and many more. He would also be a member of important panels for appointments of Lokpal, CBI chief, Chief Election Commissioner and other Election Commissioners, besides the selection of Central Vigilance Commission, the Central Information Commission and the NHRC chief. So, Rahul now has burdens and opportunities to prove his mettle.
