Profile VARUN

By Bhavna Vij-Aurora

arun nahin aandhi hai, doosra also sent a shiver down the spine of her chief political hai,” said his supporters outside jail as opponent in , Samajwadi Party chief Vtheir new found saviour, clad in a red kurta and , who staged a surprising defence of sporting vermilion on his forehead, repeatedly Varun, saying he was not “anti-national” and that slapping gestured in the air. For someone who has lived in the the NSA on him was an injustice. He was clearly worried The shadow of his father’s lost legacy, the longed for compar- that an emboldened Mayawati would use the NSA against ison must not have been lost. Especially with BJP’s prime his workers. As for the Congress, it was sent scurrying into minister-in-waiting Lal Krishna Advani’s shocking a defensive mode, with Prime Minister endorsement a day later, comparing him to Sanjay and saying the Centre had nothing to do with the NSA. Rising ’s bete noire, Jayaprakash Narayan. By For Varun, who has sought Supreme Court relief, as detaining Varun under the National Security Act (NSA), well as an upgrade of security in view of the greater “threat Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati achieved the perception”, the acceptance by the BJP must be a sweet impossible: she transformed Varun, whose inflammatory victory. Whether in jail or out of it, he has got the support Hate statements about Muslims in election of the entire Sangh Parivar and an equal rallies in Pilibhit had initially stunned if not higher national profile than his even the BJP into confused silence, into a BYCOMPARING cousin. Both the mother, who is fighting pin-up. By saying in from neighbouring Aonla, after winning Bhubaneshwar that Varun’s detention HIS ARRESTTO six times from Pilibhit, and the son will SCION reminded him of the arrest of “great pa- JAYAPRAKASH get a place of prominence in the party if triots like Jayaprakash Narayan, Morarji they manage to win. The BJP has already NARAYAN’S A detention under Desai and ” who adopted him as a victim of vendetta even were imprisoned under the Maintenance DURING THE as it maintains that he never made the the National of Internal Security Act, Advani immedi- EMERGENCY, questionable parts of the speech. It Security Act gives ately sanctified Varun’s vicious gambit, to needed an icon to revive the party in use the politics of hate to get what he has ADVANI HAS Uttar Pradesh and will exploit Varun’s the other Gandhi always longed for, national prominence. SANCTIFIED newly-discovered extremist appeal. To what he has The irony of the situation was clearly lost top it all, as Varun’s supporters who on Advani—that he was praising the son VARUN’S fought an eight-hour-long battle with the always craved. of the man who had instigated the VICIOUS GAMBIT. police on the day he courted arrest, Acres of prime Emergency in the country. showed, he can inspire street fights. For Mayawati, under attack from Ironically, though, after the initial time coverage both the Congress and the Samajwadi euphoria when Pramod Mahajan in- and Advani’s Party for allowing Varun to lead a huge procession through ducted him into the party in 2004, Varun has been strug- the busy roads of Pilibhit despite Section 144 of the IPC, gling to gain acceptance, especially with the RSS, attending endorsement, slapping the NSA on him was an opportunity to answer her functions by the side of the then Sangh supremo even as the BJP critics who felt she had allowed the 29-year-old monster- K.S. Sudarshan, and penning hawkish articles on national in-the-making to hog television coverage. By invoking the security in the Organiser. His abiding self-confidence and finds itself with NSA for the first time since against a inborn desire for leadership have been seen as misplaced a new pin-up. candidate, she displayed her decisiveness to handle her arrogance and in 2006, he was denied the ticket adversaries—she had earlier prevented Advani from from Vidisha during the by-elections. addressing a public rally in the state. By acting tough Being Feroze Varun Gandhi, sometime messiah of hate against the BJP leaders she was sending a strong signal to and sometime sensitive, if unintelligible, poet, must not be VARUN IS BJP’S NEW the Muslims in the state who have the power to influence easy. Consumed by anger at having been denied his right- POLL MASCOT the electoral outcome in 20 crucial Lok Sabha setas. She ful inheritance, and yet unable to create his own personal AFP

Lost 1980 Congress returns 1982 Maneka accuses mother-in-law Indira 1982 Feroze Varun with 2004 Feroze Varun LEGACY to power and Indira Gandhi of harassing her before leaving her Indira Gandhi on his father’s joins the BJP along with Gandhi becomes prime 1, Safdarjung Road home amid high drama. death anniversary. Maneka his mother. In 2009, The estranged minister again. Feroze Maneka and Varun spend the night at a hotel. alleges that Sanjay’s death the party fields Varun Gandhi has Varun is born to Sanjay anniversary is being turned from Pilibhit in Uttar emerged as and on into a day of farcical Pradesh after Maneka March 13 in . tamashas and show of vacates the con- the new poster Sanjay dies in a plane strength by the Congress 1983 Maneka forms a political party, the stituency from where boy of the crash when his son is party and declares it a Rashtriya Sanjay Manch, named after her she was elected to right just three months old. Vidhwa Diwas (widows’ day). husband. In 1988, she joins the Janata Dal. Lok Sabha six times. Profile VARUN GANDHI

political space, the most famous inhabitant of the high- family friend Pritish Nandy. Between him and his mother, security ward of Etah district jail finds himself where he they have an art collection which can put any self-respect- has always yearned to be. Smack bang in the spotlight. ing gallery to shame, boasting of all the big names in Indian It is a trajectory his father, brattish and brutish by turns, contemporary art. He dedicated his book of poetry The would almost be proud of. After all, it is his father whom he Otherness of Self to his mother in 2000, “for showing me most admires as well. “I want to have his courage and that integrity is never a burden”. But the collection also strength of character. He stood for what he believed in, even revealed his loneliness and confusion. As he writes in the if others did not agree with him,’’ Varun said two days forlorn Alone: Sometimes I wished I lived alone/and no one before leaving for Pilibhit to court arrest for his inflamma- came by/It would be nice to breathe alone/All my thoughts tory comments. Who is the real Varun—now called Feroze in solitude/and then it seems like being all alone/is like only by those closest to him? Is he a victim, still no more than being in a crowd/my thoughts trapped in confusion/Like a a helpless three-month-old who saw his father’s rising star kite caught in the sky/Imagine being caught in the sky. crashlanding in the Pitts Varun grew up in an all- S-2A flames? Is he BHASKAR PAUL woman household, com- a shrewd strategist, who VARUN WITH THE LATE prising three headstrong sees a position as a funda- PRAMOD MAHAJAN and willful women, mother mentalist rabble rouser Maneka, whose ambitious being better than the Rashtriya Sanjay Manch obscurity of being forever came to naught after Indira the lesser Gandhi? Is he his Gandhi’s death; aunt mother’s charming escort Ambika Shukla who runs at socialite art dos, the NGO, People For discussing Murakami and Animals; and grandmother Mishima, with genteel Amteshwar Anand, no artists and glitzy stars? Or is stranger to controversy, he a born again son of having at various times the soil who revels in been a target of the venomous language Mohammed Yunus’s of barbarians? scurrilous writings and the His teachers at the capital’s cruel scandal- British School in Delhi, mongering? They could not where he studied between have failed to remind him 1994 and 1996, after his of his lost inheritance and initial years at the idyllic his absent father. As he said Rishi Valley in Andhra to TODAY in 2004: “My Pradesh, have interesting father was my grand- stories about him. Pamela mother’s chosen son. He Talwar, who taught him passed away and my uncle Hindi, recalls that as a THE BJPWILLNOWPORTRAY inherited his political 14-year-old he had VARUN AS AVICTIM OFVENDETTA mantle. The whole nation watched a movie on India’s knows that.’’ And then a first home minister Sardar IN MAYAWATI’S UTTAR PRADESH. little later, “You think I have Vallabhbhai Patel and had it easy? You think my wanted to discuss it in mother has had it easy?’’ class. When she discouraged him, he argued, asking why He is described by his chatterati friends as being “quiet, not? “He then went on to say that used austere and thoughtful” though artist Anjolie Ela Menon to get his clothes stitched and laundered in Paris, so how who illustrated his book calls him a “spoilt brat” who did could he be a patriot. According to him, Patel was a bigger not even thank her for her work, which was free. When he nationalist and should have been the first prime minister of was studying law and philosophy at Durham University in the country,’’ she recalls. 1998-1999, he was a bit of a dandy-about-town. Living off His academic credentials are questionable though, with a handsome allowance of £1,500 a month, which he ran out his London School of Economics degree actually a of in two weeks, Varun would frequent fashionable restau- University of London degree gained as an external student. rants and nightclubs, using late hotelier Lalit Suri’s Mayfair He claims to have done his postgraduation in public policy flat as Party Central. Hadrian Brezeniak, a 30-year-old soft- from the School of Oriental and African Studies but it is ware consultant was one of his closest friends then and something that he never completed. Varun has always had describes him as being always generous with his money. a keen interest in art and poetry, spurred no doubt by And now with his venom. with Subhash Mishra

34 INDIA TODAY ◆ APRIL 13, 2009 NEW