"Hello, Uncle": Rahul Gandhi's Shout-Out To His "Favourite" BJP Leader

It is Amarinder Singh, Rahul Gandhi said without missing a beat when asked who was his favourite politician from the rival BJP.

"Captain Amarinder Singh, definitely. I get along with him, he's cool and he is an expert on military history, so I like him quite a lot. Hello, Uncle Amarinder," Gandhi, dressed in his trademark white T-shirt and camel coloured trousers, said during an "ask me anything" session with students, Gen Z on Instagram.

"Hello, Uncle Amarinder!"

LoP Shri @RahulGandhi gives a warm shoutout to his favourite politician from the BJP. pic.twitter.com/kwgQPDZ5SV

— Congress (@INCIndia) August 6, 2026

The outreach to Gen Z comes a day after Gandhi met a group of students who had protested last month seeking then education minister Dharmendra Pradhan's resignation over the NEET paper leak and were at the receiving end of the police crackdown, facing teargas and pellet guns.

Gandhi, the Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha, has been regularly posting snippets from his interaction with students and parents on Instagram recently.

More than half of India's population of 1.4 billion consists of those younger than 35, and Gen Z is expected to form one of the largest voting blocs by the time the general election is held in 2029.

Former Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh, popularly known as "Captain", joined the BJP in 2022, nearly a year after he quit the Congress following his abrupt sacking as Chief Minister before the Punjab assembly elections. Amarinder Singh also merged his Punjab Lok Congress with the BJP. He had formed the party last year, soon after exiting the Congress, his party of five decades.

In June, Amarinder Singh, a former Congress leader, shared that Rahul Gandhi wished him on his birthday and also condoled the loss his brother - gestures he said were absent from the BJP.

He further remarked that the political culture within Congress felt more consultative.

Drawing comparisons between the two parties, Amarinder Singh noted that the Congress leadership would regularly seek his input on Punjab-related matters, while decision-making in the BJP appears more centralised.

Further during the session, asked if he was Batman, Gandhi, in a lighter vein, said, "Let's just say that no one has ever seen me and Batman in the same room together!"

To a question on which philosophy interests him the most, Gandhi said, "All the different philosophies that have shaped our Constitution from Lord Buddha, Guru Nanak Dev, Basavanna ji, Sankardev ji Dharti Abba, Birsa Munda, Periyar, Mahatma Phule, Narayana Guru ji, Babasaheb Ambedkar, Gandhiji, and so many more."

Over weeks, Instagram has emerged as a key political messaging platform among the political leaders.

The BJP too is making efforts to reach out to the Gen Z, with Prime Minister Narendra Modi fronting the reels. In one of the videos, the BJP borrowed the Friends theme song to pitch Modi as the one who will be "there for you".

The Prime Minister has nudged his colleagues to be active on Instagram to reach out to the younger generation.