Rahul in Aligarh Muslim University. (Naeem Ansari)

Dec. 7: The question from the college girl was direct.

“Mr Gandhi, can a Muslim ever become Prime Minister of India?” Umme Kulsum, 21, asked.

Rahul Gandhi paused a while as an expectant hush descended on Kennedy Hall, packed with Aligarh Muslim University students. It was the day after the Babri demolition anniversary, and a few hundred miles away Parliament was discussing the Liberhan report.

“It is not about what religion or community you come from,” Rahul replied, “it is what you bring to the table, what capability you have.”

But the science undergraduate, one of 800 students picked to attend Rahul’s programme on the AMU campus this morning, persisted. “Muslims have come a long way after Independence. Sir, how long will it take for India to have its first Muslim Prime Minister?”

Rahul smiled and reworded what he had just said: “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, when you do have a Muslim Pri-me Minister, he will be a Prime Minister because he is the most capable person.”

He added that nobody would ever have imagined that India would have a Sikh Prime Minister when Sikhs made up a very small percentage of the country’s population.

The Amethi MP wore a brown cap usually associated with the minority community which was gifted to him, along with a black sherwani, by the students at the campus gate where he had arrived around 10.30am. He drove straight to the mazaar of AMU founder Syed Ahmad Khan to place a wreath before starting his 45-minute interaction with the students.

Budding engineer Mohd Tezauddin asked Rahul about the future of Muslims in Indian politics.

“You need to step up; the number of leaders coming out of your community needs to go up. You should join politics more and more in numbers,” the Congress general secretary said.

“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. Isn’t it unfortunate that today there are not many young Muslim leaders active in national politics? It is my aim that within the next five years, there should be at least 25 young Muslims at the centre stage….”

The theme fitted in nicely with the objective of Rahul’s two-day Uttar Pradesh tour from today: regaining ground for the Congress and encouraging the youth to join the party.

“Rahul Gandhi is a different kind of politician. He has altered our view of politics,” engineering student Anam Rice Khan later said.

Vice-chancellor P.K. Abdul Aziz requested Rahul to take up with the Prime Minister the issue of AMU’s minority status, which is in court, and the Rs 2,000-crore package the university has sought for its expansion in three states, including Bengal.

The university teachers’ association described Rahul’s visit — his first to AMU — as “historic”.

Rahul is the third from his family to visit the university, which his great-grandfather Jawaharlal Nehru had visited five times since 1934. “His last trip was on October 17, 1962, when he was chief guest on Syed Ahmad Khan Day. After that, there was a gap of 41 years when no Nehru-Gandhi visited AMU. Then Sonia Gandhi came in 2003 to attend a workshop on Nehru,” said AMU professor and spokesperson Abrar Rahat.

Teachers said the university had never invited Indira Gandhi or Rajiv Gandhi. They said Muslim scholars’ alienation from the Congress had peaked during the 1980s, especially after doors were opened for a shilanyas in Ayodhya.