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The man who taught Sonia Hindi

Sharat Pradhan in Varanasi

Behind every successful woman there is a man. And in Italian-born Sonia Gandhi's case, it is Ratnakar Pandey, a 61-year-old Congressman, who is the party candidate in Varanasi.

Of course, Pandey can't take the credit for all of Sonia's successes. But one thing he surely can is puff out his chest and prune over Madame's fluent, though heavily accented, Hindi -- after all, wasn't it he who taught her the language?

Yep, it was. But Pandey would rather not talk of the matter. 'No comment' is all the comment he care to make about it.

No one is certain why he has suddenly become so cagey about this. The common guess, however, is he does not want to give the impression that he was awarded the ticket simply because of this 'tutor-student' relationship.

"She is my leader. She is the leader of the party," he remarks, when hard pressed, "Tomorrow she will be the leader of the country."

Critics, naturally, do not agree. But they certainly feel without Hindi, Madame would have been completely lost in the cow-belts. In contrast, she is now pulling mammoth crowds and convincing them of her husband's innocence, her family's sacrifices for the country and sundry other little matters.

All because of this modest old man, Pandey, who recently retired as the principal of the Moti Lal Nehru college under Delhi university.

Pandey, we found out, though adamant, will melt a couple of degrees in front of persistent pleads.

"Well, language is not a problem for Soniaji," he says.

But, we ask, wasn't there a recent picture in a popular English weekly showing her reading out of a text printed in both Devanagari and Roman?

"So what?" the protective tutor, the loyal partyman, shoots back, "Her thoughts are not bought, they are her own. And that is what matters."

Taking strong exception to her being referred to as 'foreigner' he says: "You must realise that she is emotionally even more Indian than anybody else. After all when she fell in love with the son of the then prime minister of the world's largest democracy, she was only 20. Now for more than two-and-a-half decades she has been living every minute like a true Indian wife.

"Soniaji's biggest contribution is that she has united the Congress which was otherwise on the verge of fragmentation. Within the party, she can transcend the barriers of language with ease."

Dating his association with the Nehru-Gandhi family back to 1966, he recalled how the relationship continued during Rajiv Gandhi's time.

"You see, India is a country which looks for its leader only in the Nehru-Gandhi family. Today, after a long interval, we have found one." he says, ''Haven't you observed the confidence that has grown manifold since she took over as the party's key campaigner? Much of it is attributable to the increasing command she has acquired over Hindi."

Pandey, who has been a Rajya Sabha member earlier, is contesting a general election for the first time. For long, his and the Kamalapati Tripathi family had vied for the Congress ticket in Varanasi. More often than not, it was the Tripathis who emerged winner. But now, thanks to his proximity to the Gandhis 'essentially on account of teaching skills', it is his turn.