Rahul Gandhi was born in New Delhi, India, as the first of two children to Rajiv Gandhi and Sonia Gandhi, who hails from Italy. |
He is the grandson of the late Indira Gandhi, former Prime Minister of India, and Feroze Gandhi. |
Rahul is the great-grandson of Jawaharlal Nehru, India's first Prime Minister. |
After the turmoil caused by Sikh extremism following Indira Gandhi's assassination, Rahul and his sister were mostly homeschooled. |
Due to security concerns after his father's assassination in 1991, Rahul transferred from Harvard University to Rollins College. |
During his college days, he went by the name "Raul Vinci" to maintain his anonymity. |
After graduation, he started his career at a management consulting firm in London called Monitor Group, earning around £2500-£3000 as his first paycheck. |
Rahul Gandhi became a director at Backops Services Private Ltd, a Mumbai-based technology outsourcing company. |
In 2004, he entered active politics by contesting and winning his first Lok Sabha election from Amethi constituency in Uttar Pradesh by over a lakh votes. |
Rahul Gandhi did not hold any official position in the Indian National Congress until 2006. |
He has been nicknamed 'Pappu' on social media and was referred to as 'Pappu Ji' by former cabinet minister Venkaiah Naidu in the Lok Sabha. |
In December 2017, Rahul Gandhi was elected unopposed as the President of the Indian National Congress. |
During his visit to Singapore in 2018, a journalist questioned the development under Congress regimes in his speech. |
In a surprising moment in Parliament on 21 July 2018, Rahul Gandhi hugged PM Narendra Modi and winked at his party colleagues during his speech. |
Rahul Gandhi has a black belt in Aikido and used to partake in boxing during his college years. |
He faced criticism during a Lok Sabha debate in 2023 for sending what seemed like a flying kiss towards the treasury benches which led to accusations of misogyny. |
In 2024, he won Lok Sabha seats from Raebareli and Wayanad, choosing to retain Raebareli and letting go of Wayanad for Priyanka Gandhi to contest. |
Rahul Gandhi is known to be a dog lover and often shares pictures of his pet dogs on social media. |