To me, both Varun Gandhi’s alleged “inflammatory video” and his actual statements came as a surprise. I didn’t know he thought of himself as a Hindu, and his calling himself one came as a pleasant surprise. Not that anyone can deny him the “previlege”, but it does smack of a lot of politics. Let’s see, when did Hindu ancestry die in the Nehru-Gandhi family? His great grandfather Jawahar Lal Nehru was of Kashmiri Pandit ancestry (although he thought of himself as an atheist, that does not make him any less of a Hindu). His daughter Indira married a Parsi, which makes her sons Sanjay and Rajiv 50% Hindus. I wonder if either of them was a practising Hindu, or thought anything of their father’s Zoroastrianism. Rajiv married a Christian woman, and Sanjay married a Sikh. That leaves the next generation with 25% Hindu blood. But that doesn’t matter; perhaps the blue Brahmin blood always remained dominant in the family, for political reasons. In any case, to those who believe in an inclusive form of Hinduism, it does not really matter either; to them anybody considering India their punyabhumi is a Hindu, and to the puritans, no amount of shuddhi can make a varnasankar (someone of a mixed caste) a Hindu. (This link from a Parsi religious website quoting from Gita to prevent Parsi-Hindu matrimony is quite interesting.)
Now Priyanka Gandhi Vadra is asking cousin Feroze Varun Gandhi to read the Gita. I wonder if she herself has read it, and if she has, which chapter would she recommend? I mean, does Bhagvadgita say anything about other religions? What does it say about getting your rights from your cousins, in particular? Does it say anything about Islam?
From people urging Varun to learn from his cousins, I would like to know, what exactly does he have to learn from them? What have they done for the country, except for the accident of their birth? And that much he has done too, hasn’t he? Then he has also stood a little on his own, which his cousins have not done. Positively or negatively, that can be debated.
Now, is the tape doctored, as Varun Gandhi has alleged? Someone needs to look into that. (Update 10-Apr: Read my new post on the subject: Varun Gandhi Videos May Be A Scam
Tags: indiavotes09, varun gandhi
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Our politicians have been dividing the society on the basis of religion/caste for such a long time.
Now if poor newbie Varun said something, why is it such a big deal? Because he isn’t with one of the ’secular’ parties?
As it is, we will probably never find out whether he even said anything or not. The one who shouts the loudest is correct, in modern India.
The hypocrisy of it all boggles the mind sometimes.
The greatest irony in the whole episode was depicted very nicely by DNA cartoonist Manjul where he showed Maneka Gandhi in the fore shouting ‘Save the animals” and Varun following her and shouting “Kill Humans”.
Varun is one of the many young politicians who, owing to their political lineage, were made to believe that its in their blood but have no clue what they are doing there. being phoren bred they are neither articulate enough to talk in the lingo our people speak nor experienced enough to sense what works here and what not. So they would do whatever the “organisers”, local politicians or the crowd says them to.
At Pillibheet Varun did what Congress and other parties do for appeasing the crowd all the time, deliver some “paisa vasool”, “exciting” dialogues depending on the mood of the crowd. While he had his foot in his mouth later (and I still cannot stop myself from smiling remembering the IBNLive TV interview scene where Varun’s aunt just barged in leaving both Varun and the reporter aghast, that was a total filmy chaos).
What Varun needs urgently is not a lesson from Gita but few smacks on his bum (or rap on his knuckles) for immediately curing his foot-in-the-mouth disease. He dreamt of becoming a Sanjay Gandhi overnight and he could not even become a Raj Thackrey.
@amreekandesi
You are right. I wonder why one of the news channels doesn’t do their own investigative voice analysis of the video, instead of rewinding the same clips over and over again.
@Debashish
, the boy has got “dum” in his voice. And trust me there are more “bigots” (like me) than you think who support him.
That is an accurate analysis. However, in a country that worships individuals just for their lineage, how likely is it that he will get ahead inspite of the foot-in-mouth disease? His read problem may be, though, that he is in the wrong party, whose star refuses to rise. Rajiv Gandhi had lesser credentials to show when he took rein of the nation in ‘84. Omar Abdullah, and even Farooq Abdullah, never had any grassroots experience or support. Same goes for dozens of other “star” sons. Let us see how this sapoot of the dynasty makes out. Unless the voice in the inflammatory video is really not his
As it is, we will probably never find out whether he even said anything or not.
I wonder why one of the news channels doesn’t do their own investigative, whether priyanka gandhi has read gita
A bible toting babe like Priyamnka should not be gassing on about the Gita of which she kinows nothing. Nor should she be hypocritically draping herself in saris when she is the original disco dame. That’s where she met her dancing dude Robert Vadra (wot’s a Vadra?)son of a cabaret dancer performing at Delhi’s Purple Pussycat Night club.