Daijiworld Media Network - New Delhi

New Delhi, Nov 10: Congress leader Sonia Gandhi had decided months before the 2004 Lok Sabha elections that she would not become prime minister even if the Congress-led alliance won the polls, according to her upcoming memoir, Belonging: A Journey of Love, which is set to be released on Tuesday.

In the memoir, published by HarperCollins India, Sonia recounts how her children, Rahul and Priyanka Gandhi, had asked her whether she would accept the top post if the party emerged victorious. Her response, she writes, was emphatic: “Absolutely not!”

“Some months before the election, my children and I had discussed the issue of my possible prime ministership. One of them asked me straight out whether I would accept the post, just in case our party pulled off a victory. ‘Absolutely not!’ I’d said, almost indignantly,” she writes.

Sonia says both Rahul and Priyanka opposed the idea because of the trauma they had experienced following the assassinations of their grandmother, former prime minister Indira Gandhi, and their father, former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi.

“They’d lived through the trauma of their grandmother’s assassination and the brutal murder of their father. In their minds, holding that office was intrinsically linked with heightened danger,” she writes, adding that her children appeared relieved when she made her position clear.

However, she kept her views private during the election campaign, saying the Congress was fighting for its political survival and she did not want an internal leadership struggle to weaken the party.

“We were in a battle for our survival and I had to keep my party together, to face our foes head-on as a cohesive team. It wasn’t an option to allow a leadership struggle to arise between the contenders in our party,” she writes.

She also believed that whoever carried forward the legacy of previous Congress governments should have substantial experience in governance and an impeccable record of integrity.

The question became unavoidable after the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance (UPA) won the 2004 elections. Sonia says she was torn between her personal reservations and her sense of responsibility towards party workers and voters.

“One part of me rejected the idea completely, the other part was calling on my sense of obligation—towards the party workers who’d be hurt and disappointed by my refusal, but also to the people who’d given us their vote,” she writes.

When alliance leaders gathered at her residence to persuade her to accept the prime minister’s post, Sonia says she listened silently for more than an hour before conveying her decision.

She describes the meeting as an intense confrontation, with leaders surrounding her and insisting that they would not accept her refusal. Feeling overwhelmed by the pressure, she recalls mumbling, “Theek hai” (All right).

The leaders immediately began congratulating her, believing she had agreed to become prime minister. However, Priyanka, who had witnessed the exchange from outside the conference room, felt her mother was being pressured into accepting the post and rushed to find Rahul.

When her children confronted her, Sonia told them: “I don’t want to do it, you know I don’t. I was being pressurised.”

Rahul reacted angrily, asking, “Pressurised? You are being pressurised? What about us?” Priyanka reminded her mother that she had been clear about her decision from the beginning and urged her not to give in to pressure.

Another major consideration was the controversy surrounding her Italian origin. Sonia believed the BJP and its allies would use the issue to create political turmoil if she became prime minister.

“The BJP and its allies would for certain use my ‘foreign origin’ as an issue, they would stir up emotions and create havoc that would subsume every other good—of the past, and of the coming years. How could I agree to holding the office of prime minister knowing it could wound my country, the country that I loved? No, never!” she writes.

Sonia also recalls spending an emotional night reflecting on her decision. Lying on her husband's side of the bed, she says she heard two conflicting voices in her mind. One questioned whether someone born and brought up in Italy should lead a country of more than a billion people, while the other reminded her of her bond with India and her allegiance to the country.

By the time she was drifting off to sleep, she says, her mind had become clear. “Sonia, be true to yourself,” she recalls telling herself. “You’ve always known it. Just leave it!”

The following morning, she went to Rahul’s room and confirmed that she would stick to her decision. Rahul embraced her and told her, “It’s the right decision.” Sonia writes that she felt at peace for the first time since the election results were declared.

She faced another round of appeals at the Congress Parliamentary Party meeting, where several leaders urged her to reconsider. Sonia had expected to deliver her speech and nominate former finance minister Manmohan Singh as her successor, but one leader after another spoke in favour of her becoming prime minister.

When she finally addressed the gathering, she reiterated that the post had never been her ambition.

“Throughout these past six years that I have been in politics, one thing has been clear to me. And that is, as I have often stated, that the post of prime minister is not my aim,” she told the gathering.

She added that her inner voice was guiding her to decline the offer. “Today that voice tells me I must humbly decline this post.”

The announcement triggered protests from party MPs, some of whom surrounded the lectern and pleaded with her to change her mind. Sonia writes that she had to interrupt her speech midway after feeling faint and struggling to breathe.

When she resumed, she explained that power and position had never been her motivation.

“Power in itself has never attracted me, nor has position been my goal,” she said. “My aim has always been to defend the secular foundation of our nation and the poor of our country—the creed sacred to Indiraji and Rajivji.”

She made it clear that declining the prime minister’s post did not mean withdrawing from politics or abandoning her responsibilities towards the Congress. She urged the MPs to accept her decision, making it clear that she would not reverse it.

Sonia subsequently proposed Manmohan Singh as her successor. He became prime minister and led the UPA government for two consecutive terms, from 2004 to 2014.

The memoir offers Sonia’s personal account of one of the most consequential decisions of her political career, revealing that she had resolved not to become prime minister well before the 2004 election results, despite pressure from alliance leaders and colleagues within her own party.