Dear Express Reader Rahul Gandhi is doing the yatra, and the yatra may also be doing Rahul Gandhi. One of the big questions the new year could bring an answer to is whether, and to what effect, the Bharat Jodo Yatra is re-inventing its lead Yatri. What is already becoming clear is this: Even if it often seems that Rahul is yet to find a language for what he wants to say, Yatra visuals are fresh and striking. Rahul on-the-move is brought to you in a wide range of photogenic settings, with different and diverse groups, men, women, children - and dog. There was Rahul in Karnal in one frame from Saturday, a few days after he resumed the Yatra following a nine-day break. Walking with him is boxer Vijender Singh, and marching ahead of him, stretching tight the leash Rahul holds and also wraps around his wrist, tail up, tongue hanging out, is Luna, the golden retriever who belongs to Priyanka Gandhi. With an eye for the arresting photo-op that it seems to have borrowed only lately from the Modi-BJP playbook, the Congress party immediately put out images and a video set to music on social media to make that small heartwarming moment, starring Rahul and Luna, larger. In other photos from the resumed Yatra last week, Rahul was shown on Tuesday walking in Northeast Delhi, the densely populated part of the national capital where communal riots raged amid anti-CAA and anti-NRC protests in February 2020. He was in Baghpat, walking with local leaders of the RLD, which became the second Opposition party after the National Conference to join the Yatra, on Wednesday. He was holding hands with Mallikarjun Kharge, the newly elected Congress president, on a rally stage in Panipat on Friday. Just over these last few days, then, the photos of Rahul have portrayed him as, in no particular order, a leader who has affection for animals, who is reaching out to his own party, and other parties of the Opposition, and also to the ordinary people who have borne the brunt of communal violence recently. Those made-for-camera images add to a burgeoning photo gallery — Rahul tying the shoelaces of his mother, Sonia; kissing his sister Priyanka; hugging an unnamed man/woman with a grizzled and weather-beaten face; walking with a young boy astride his shoulders; holding hands with those who walk with him. So yes, the images and videos from the Yatra do push back at the well-resourced and powerful BJP-led campaign to mock Rahul as the entitled wannabe. Yes, by showcasing him as a leader at ease on the street, they do Rahul a good turn. And yet, having said that, the remaking-of-Rahul still has hurdles to overcome, even apart from the fact that his basic message of "love versus hate" seems to side-step and skirt too much - not just the elections taking place while the Yatra is on, but also, other issues and events that are politically specific. For one, the yatra has been and continues to be a well-worn instrument of many an Indian politician's repertoire, and therefore, while it may yield some attractive images for the eyes of the voter, it may earn Rahul no special brownie points electorally. Like at the election rally, the crowds at the yatra are usually filled with spectators who do not necessarily become voters. As far as the voter is concerned, the yatra may go some way, or it may not, in addressing a glaring and persisting absence in Rahul's repertoire - he doesn't have political or administrative experience, he has not held a position of responsibility, unlike Modi. There is also a challenge that the Yatra has only erratically taken up so far — of not just mobilising those who are already anti-BJP or pro-Congress, but also reaching out across the political divide. By all accounts, it crossed over the battle lines in UP, where among those invited to join the Yatra were not just leaders of non-BJP parties, but also, significantly, sants who had been part of the BJP-led movement for the Ram temple in Ayodhya. The Yatra needs to do much more of this than it has done so far. Most of all, the problem the Yatra may face in reaching its intended destination is that even as Rahul is moving, so is his political opponent. Those photo-ops are also being brought to us and more constantly. Rahul is using the Yatra to climb out of the box the BJP's vast propaganda machine has sought to lock him into, but Modi is not standing still either. In the year ahead, indications are already in, Modi will change the subject, shift his own repertoire of appeals — the self-congratulatory hype on India assuming the G20 presidency is a pointer of more to come in the run-up to 2024. In the year ahead, you can expect Modi-in-the-world to be a dominant image, lifting Modi above the ground just as Rahul gets bolder and surer in planting his own feet on it. As the countdown begins to the big contest next year, it will be exciting to watch these two. Till next week, Vandita | 
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