Pranab also favours Rahul as PM

Yet another senior Cong minister came out in support of Rahul Gandhi being made the PM candidate in the next elections.

Yet another senior Congress minister on Tuesday came out in support of Rahul Gandhi being made the prime ministerial candidate in the next elections.

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"Arjun Singh has done nothing wrong in suggesting that Rahul Gandhi be made the prime ministerial candidate," External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee told reporters in New Delhi.

"Always the leadership goes to the youth. It is a universal truth," he said when asked about Singh's comments on projecting Rahul Gandhi as the prime ministerial face, an idea that drew immediate support from ally and chief minister M Karunanidhi.

DMK chief M Karunanidhi came out in support of Arjun Singh's statement.

"I will be happy if he is made the Prime Ministerial candidate", the Tamil Nadu Chief Minister said in Chennai on Monday.
Sharad Pawar-led NCP has said that it would support whoever the Congress party chooses for the top post.

The AICC has so far steered clear of the issue and has been maintaining that an appropriate decision would be taken at an appropriate time as elections are still far away.

Mukherjee downplayed a question whether the next Lok Sabha elections would be a battle between "38 versus 83" implying young Rahul versus octogenarian L K Advani, who is BJP's Prime Ministerial candidate.

When told that Rajiv Gandhi was also a young leader who dreamt of the 21st century, Mukherjee recalled that the late Prime Minister had come under attack for several things including computer and phones.

He suggested that now the people were the best judge of the advances made by India due to ideas of the young leader.