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WHY Varun Gandhi?

WHY Varun Gandhi?

Why Varun Gandhi? BJP RSS mission beyond Modi Shah era will be determined by the choice of young leadership available with the party in the next decade. Varun Gandhi who has carved a niche for himself beyond his haloed family can be the answer; off course along with the top young leadership of the party namely UP CM Yogi, Maharastra CM Devendra Fernavis, Anurag Thakur, Smiriti Irani and others. Today he has expressed complete faith and appreciation for the current leadership of the party and surprisingly, he is critical of the present Congress leadership. According to him, there is absolutely no match for Narendra Modi leadership in the country and he has expressed confidence that Prime Minister Modi will guide BJP to stupendous victory in GE 2019.

BJP leader and youth icon Varun Gandhi is a sitting Member of Parliament for Lok Sabha from the Sultanpur constituency and likely to be renominated from Pilibhit parliamentary constituency soon. He is also member of Bharatiya Janata Party and was inducted into Rajnath Singh’s team in March 2012 as General Secretary. Though Varun Gandhi is a member of the Nehru-Gandhi family but he has carved out an independent identity in the national politics with tremendous hard work and strategic vision. Varun attended Rishi valley School and Modern School C.P. New Delhi and the British School, New Delhi where he ran for a position on the student council. Varun earned Bachelor of Science (Hons) in Economics from University of London. Varun Gandhi was first introduced to the Pilibhit constituency by his mother during the 1999 election campaigning. Maneka had been a part of the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) since earlier but she and Varun formally joined BJP in 2004. Varun Gandhi campaigned for the party in the 2004 elections, covering over 40 constituencies. In an interview to Stephen Sackur in BBC’s HARDTALK in October 2005, Gandhi answered questions about the reasons behind his political affiliation and defended his father as someone who had helped revive the industrialisation of India by starting Maruti Udyog and whose strategy helped the Congress party’s comeback after the first ever non-Congress Janata Party government following an electoral routing for the Indira Gandhi-government after Emergency, among many other things.

In the 2009 general election, the BJP decided to field Varun Gandhi as its candidate from the Pilibhit constituency instead of his mother Maneka Gandhi. He won the seat by receiving 419,539 votes and defeated his nearest contending candidate, V.M. Singh, by a margin of 281,501 votes. The victory was the strongest of any of the four Gandhi family candidates in the election: his mother Maneka Gandhi, aunt Sonia Gandhi and first cousin Rahul Gandhi. The security deposits of all other candidates, including those of V.M. Singh of the Indian National Congress and the Bahujan Samaj Party candidate Ganga Charan Rajput were forfeited. A case was filed against Gandhi for allegedly making a provocative speech about Muslims, at a meeting at Dalchand Mohalla area of Pilibhit, however he was acquitted by in court in the matter. On 5 March 2013, a Pilibhit court acquitted Gandhi in the second hate speech case registered against him during the 2009 Lok Sabha election campaign. In March 2013, Rajnath Singh appointed Varun Gandhi as the national general secretary of the BJP. He became the youngest ever general secretary of the party. In May 2013, Varun Gandhi was made in-charge of the BJP’s affairs in West Bengal. In June 2013, Gandhi requested Lok Sabha Speaker Meira Kumar to call an emergency all party meeting in view of the calamity in Uttarakhand in which thousands of people had died. He suggested a number of steps like contribution from MPLADs fund, forgoing of three months’ salary by MPs and tax incentives for corporate and individuals for help. He has said that he spoke to many MPs and all of them were ready to contribute. He said that the Speaker should act as a catalyst and coordinate the action plan. In July 2013, Gandhi handed over a cheque of Rs 1 lakh from his salary account to family members of former Jan Sangh Member of Legislative Assembly late Bhagwati Prasad, who died at a government hospital after prolonged illness and age-related complications. The former MLA had to spend over an hour on the floor of an emergency ward before doctors at the hospital realised he was an ex-MLA and was subsequently given medical attention. His family didn’t even have money to perform the last rites after his death. Varun said he came to know about Prasad only after his death. Describing the late MLA as a model of honesty, he said it was hard to find an honest leader like him. In August 2013, newspapers reported that Gandhi was the only MP in the country who had spent cent per cent of his MP Local Area Development Fund (MPLAD) before stipulated time. According to official sources, Varun Gandhi used his funds for the development in education, health and infrastructure activities. His proposals were worth more than the entire MPLAD fund thus ensuring the entire amount of 25 crore was spent during his tenure as a Member of Parliament. His political aides stated that he submitted the proposals on time and also employed his personal team to monitor the use of money.

In September 2013, Varun Gandhi accused the Samajwadi Party-led Uttar Pradesh government of pursuing the politics of appeasement, and said that its mistakes would lead to its collapse, after it denied permission to Varun Gandhi’s rally in Agra just two days before it was scheduled to take place. He denounced Rahul Gandhi’s infamous outburst against the controversial ordinance against convicted lawmakers, and said that it was an insult to the Prime Minister, who was abroad at the time, and therefore also disgraceful to the nation. He also said that if the Prime Minister had any dignity left, he should resign immediately upon his return to the country, on the day of Rahul Gandhi’s outburst. In March 2014, he said that he holds no ill-will against Rahul Gandhi and won’t campaign against him during Lok Sabha Election.In February 2014, Gandhi kick started his campaign for election 2014 in Sultanpur. He gave an emotional speech to an enthusiastic crowd in Kadipur, and said that he had come to Sultanpur to fulfill his father’s dreams. In May 2014, Gandhi defeated Amita Singh from Sultanpur in Lok Sabha 2014 elections.In March 2016, he introduced the Representation of the People (Amendment) Bill, 2016 in Lok Sabha.

In August 2011, Varun Gandhi strongly pitched for the Jan Lokpal Bill. Gandhi offered his official residence to Hazare to hold his fast, after Hazare was denied permission by the government. When Hazare was jailed, Gandhi offered to table the Jan Lokpal Bill in Parliament.On 24 August, he went to Ramlila Maidan as a common man to support the cause of Anna Hazare, becoming the first politician to openly support the anti-corruption cause. He  writes articles and policy papers for several national dailies and magazines in India, such as The Times of India, The Hindustan Times, The Economic Times, The Indian Express, The Asian Age, The Hindu, Outlook, The Pioneer among others. He writes the largest syndicated column in the country covering 21 newspapers – including Malayala Manorama, Lokmat, Hindustan Times, Rajasthan Patrika, Punjab Kesari, Amar Ujala, Sandesh, Bartaman, Sakshi – reaching more than 200 million readers. Gandhi wrote his first volume of poems, titled The Otherness of Self, at the age of 20, in 2000. His second volume of poems, titled Stillness was published by Harper Collins in April 2015. The book became the bestselling non-fiction book, selling over 10,000 copies in the first two days of its release. In 2018, he released his book on the Indian rural economy titled The Rural Manifesto: Realising India’s Future through her villages. The book sold over 50,000 copies in ten days of its release.

BJP MP Varun Gandhi has called for change in India’s political system, including the right to recall elected representatives and more representation for women, saying people should have a greater say in democracy. He said people are less aware about the selection of their elected representatives, and choose them based on caste, religion and region, which is not the way to take the country forward.

Varun Gandhi highlighted varied issues faced by the Indian farmers: Agrarian issues have always been at the forefront the Indian electorate, as a majority of our rural population is still is largely dependent on agriculture. However, decreasing landholdings (average landholding size is 1.13 hectares, decreased marginally from 1.41 hectares in 2000, a far cry from the global average of 3.7 hectares), rising input prices, unsustainable water usage, inadequate energy access and failure to take any advantage of economies of scale make farming an increasingly difficult proposition with time. Post 1991, agriculture has grown at 1% on average, while industry has grown at 8% – we have built our economy on the backs of distraught peasants. Policy apathy and policy inefficiency have adversely impacted farmer condition over a long term. Perhaps it’s time for a re-look at our national priorities.

Inadequate marketing reforms are an important reason for dwindling farm incomes. The challenge is that the farmer loses out in both good and bad times. In bad times, crop failures lead to rural debt and in good times, it leads to drop in prices. Our increased focus on groundwater extraction, essentially a symptom of inadequate irrigation, has led India to top the list of countries with maximum freshwater withdrawals, with water availability declining by 70% since independence. Free or cheap electricity for running pumps have led to reduced investments in our agricultural mechanization, whilst contributing to the financial burden of State Electricity Boards, which in turn remain ill-equipped financially to undertake transformative initiatives in our energy transmission and distribution. Our agri-procurement policies have incentivized farming of water-intensive crops in regions with limited groundwater availability and facing risk of aridity.

Farm loan waiver is essentially an emergency measure. It remains a short term, stop-gap arrangement till credit culture improves alongside rising farmer incomes. Let us consider few figures – indebted farm households have increased from 25 percent in 1992 to 52 per cent in 2016. The average debt of an agricultural household stands at Rs 1.04 lakh, whereas the average monthly income stands at Rs 8,900 – thus, average debt is roughly their annual in
come. Nearly 70% of India’s estimated 90 million agricultural households end up spending more than their earnings, thereby being caught in a spiral of ever increasing debt. In such times of economic desperation, a farm loan waiver is needed to provide immediate relief.

Non-farm diversification is typically an important pathway for empowering especially landless labourers and marginal farmers, helping them overcome the land constraint for growth while offering sustainable income that can provide capacity to absorb external farm shocks and provide capital for agricultural investment. Most of rural non-farm income is associated with urban migration, with most village youth working as labourers in nearby towns and cities. Among non-farm income sources, livestock and construction incomes are a broad-based critical component. The recommendations of the Swaminathan Committee pertaining to distribution of ceiling surplus and wasteland shall help our landless and small/marginal farmers.

Varun Gandhi is likely to be elected in the ongoing Lok Sabha elections and he will definitely play extremely vital role in the next government. Today BJP has formidable leadership in Narendra Modi and BJP is building up gen next leadership with an intention to dominate the national politics. Varun is the front runner for handling the command from the present leadership. Surely with his experience of parliamentary life, young leader will be the key to the macro level planning of BJP RSS think-tank.

Prashant Tewari Editor-in-Chief in conversation with Varun Gandhi M.P.: Inputs from Prakhar Misra Political Editor Opinion Express.

* VARUN GANDHI’S INTERVIEW WILL BE PUBLISHED IN OPINION EXPRESS NEXT ISSUE. 

WHY Varun Gandhi?

WHY Varun Gandhi?

Why Varun Gandhi? BJP RSS mission beyond Modi Shah era will be determined by the choice of young leadership available with the party in the next decade. Varun Gandhi who has carved a niche for himself beyond his haloed family can be the answer; off course along with the top young leadership of the party namely UP CM Yogi, Maharastra CM Devendra Fernavis, Anurag Thakur, Smiriti Irani and others. Today he has expressed complete faith and appreciation for the current leadership of the party and surprisingly, he is critical of the present Congress leadership. According to him, there is absolutely no match for Narendra Modi leadership in the country and he has expressed confidence that Prime Minister Modi will guide BJP to stupendous victory in GE 2019.

BJP leader and youth icon Varun Gandhi is a sitting Member of Parliament for Lok Sabha from the Sultanpur constituency and likely to be renominated from Pilibhit parliamentary constituency soon. He is also member of Bharatiya Janata Party and was inducted into Rajnath Singh’s team in March 2012 as General Secretary. Though Varun Gandhi is a member of the Nehru-Gandhi family but he has carved out an independent identity in the national politics with tremendous hard work and strategic vision. Varun attended Rishi valley School and Modern School C.P. New Delhi and the British School, New Delhi where he ran for a position on the student council. Varun earned Bachelor of Science (Hons) in Economics from University of London. Varun Gandhi was first introduced to the Pilibhit constituency by his mother during the 1999 election campaigning. Maneka had been a part of the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) since earlier but she and Varun formally joined BJP in 2004. Varun Gandhi campaigned for the party in the 2004 elections, covering over 40 constituencies. In an interview to Stephen Sackur in BBC’s HARDTALK in October 2005, Gandhi answered questions about the reasons behind his political affiliation and defended his father as someone who had helped revive the industrialisation of India by starting Maruti Udyog and whose strategy helped the Congress party’s comeback after the first ever non-Congress Janata Party government following an electoral routing for the Indira Gandhi-government after Emergency, among many other things.

In the 2009 general election, the BJP decided to field Varun Gandhi as its candidate from the Pilibhit constituency instead of his mother Maneka Gandhi. He won the seat by receiving 419,539 votes and defeated his nearest contending candidate, V.M. Singh, by a margin of 281,501 votes. The victory was the strongest of any of the four Gandhi family candidates in the election: his mother Maneka Gandhi, aunt Sonia Gandhi and first cousin Rahul Gandhi. The security deposits of all other candidates, including those of V.M. Singh of the Indian National Congress and the Bahujan Samaj Party candidate Ganga Charan Rajput were forfeited. A case was filed against Gandhi for allegedly making a provocative speech about Muslims, at a meeting at Dalchand Mohalla area of Pilibhit, however he was acquitted by in court in the matter. On 5 March 2013, a Pilibhit court acquitted Gandhi in the second hate speech case registered against him during the 2009 Lok Sabha election campaign. In March 2013, Rajnath Singh appointed Varun Gandhi as the national general secretary of the BJP. He became the youngest ever general secretary of the party. In May 2013, Varun Gandhi was made in-charge of the BJP’s affairs in West Bengal. In June 2013, Gandhi requested Lok Sabha Speaker Meira Kumar to call an emergency all party meeting in view of the calamity in Uttarakhand in which thousands of people had died. He suggested a number of steps like contribution from MPLADs fund, forgoing of three months’ salary by MPs and tax incentives for corporate and individuals for help. He has said that he spoke to many MPs and all of them were ready to contribute. He said that the Speaker should act as a catalyst and coordinate the action plan. In July 2013, Gandhi handed over a cheque of Rs 1 lakh from his salary account to family members of former Jan Sangh Member of Legislative Assembly late Bhagwati Prasad, who died at a government hospital after prolonged illness and age-related complications. The former MLA had to spend over an hour on the floor of an emergency ward before doctors at the hospital realised he was an ex-MLA and was subsequently given medical attention. His family didn’t even have money to perform the last rites after his death. Varun said he came to know about Prasad only after his death. Describing the late MLA as a model of honesty, he said it was hard to find an honest leader like him. In August 2013, newspapers reported that Gandhi was the only MP in the country who had spent cent per cent of his MP Local Area Development Fund (MPLAD) before stipulated time. According to official sources, Varun Gandhi used his funds for the development in education, health and infrastructure activities. His proposals were worth more than the entire MPLAD fund thus ensuring the entire amount of 25 crore was spent during his tenure as a Member of Parliament. His political aides stated that he submitted the proposals on time and also employed his personal team to monitor the use of money.

In September 2013, Varun Gandhi accused the Samajwadi Party-led Uttar Pradesh government of pursuing the politics of appeasement, and said that its mistakes would lead to its collapse, after it denied permission to Varun Gandhi’s rally in Agra just two days before it was scheduled to take place. He denounced Rahul Gandhi’s infamous outburst against the controversial ordinance against convicted lawmakers, and said that it was an insult to the Prime Minister, who was abroad at the time, and therefore also disgraceful to the nation. He also said that if the Prime Minister had any dignity left, he should resign immediately upon his return to the country, on the day of Rahul Gandhi’s outburst. In March 2014, he said that he holds no ill-will against Rahul Gandhi and won’t campaign against him during Lok Sabha Election.In February 2014, Gandhi kick started his campaign for election 2014 in Sultanpur. He gave an emotional speech to an enthusiastic crowd in Kadipur, and said that he had come to Sultanpur to fulfill his father’s dreams. In May 2014, Gandhi defeated Amita Singh from Sultanpur in Lok Sabha 2014 elections.In March 2016, he introduced the Representation of the People (Amendment) Bill, 2016 in Lok Sabha.

In August 2011, Varun Gandhi strongly pitched for the Jan Lokpal Bill. Gandhi offered his official residence to Hazare to hold his fast, after Hazare was denied permission by the government. When Hazare was jailed, Gandhi offered to table the Jan Lokpal Bill in Parliament.On 24 August, he went to Ramlila Maidan as a common man to support the cause of Anna Hazare, becoming the first politician to openly support the anti-corruption cause. He  writes articles and policy papers for several national dailies and magazines in India, such as The Times of India, The Hindustan Times, The Economic Times, The Indian Express, The Asian Age, The Hindu, Outlook, The Pioneer among others. He writes the largest syndicated column in the country covering 21 newspapers – including Malayala Manorama, Lokmat, Hindustan Times, Rajasthan Patrika, Punjab Kesari, Amar Ujala, Sandesh, Bartaman, Sakshi – reaching more than 200 million readers. Gandhi wrote his first volume of poems, titled The Otherness of Self, at the age of 20, in 2000. His second volume of poems, titled Stillness was published by Harper Collins in April 2015. The book became the bestselling non-fiction book, selling over 10,000 copies in the first two days of its release. In 2018, he released his book on the Indian rural economy titled The Rural Manifesto: Realising India’s Future through her villages. The book sold over 50,000 copies in ten days of its release.

BJP MP Varun Gandhi has called for change in India’s political system, including the right to recall elected representatives and more representation for women, saying people should have a greater say in democracy. He said people are less aware about the selection of their elected representatives, and choose them based on caste, religion and region, which is not the way to take the country forward.

Varun Gandhi highlighted varied issues faced by the Indian farmers: Agrarian issues have always been at the forefront the Indian electorate, as a majority of our rural population is still is largely dependent on agriculture. However, decreasing landholdings (average landholding size is 1.13 hectares, decreased marginally from 1.41 hectares in 2000, a far cry from the global average of 3.7 hectares), rising input prices, unsustainable water usage, inadequate energy access and failure to take any advantage of economies of scale make farming an increasingly difficult proposition with time. Post 1991, agriculture has grown at 1% on average, while industry has grown at 8% – we have built our economy on the backs of distraught peasants. Policy apathy and policy inefficiency have adversely impacted farmer condition over a long term. Perhaps it’s time for a re-look at our national priorities.

Inadequate marketing reforms are an important reason for dwindling farm incomes. The challenge is that the farmer loses out in both good and bad times. In bad times, crop failures lead to rural debt and in good times, it leads to drop in prices. Our increased focus on groundwater extraction, essentially a symptom of inadequate irrigation, has led India to top the list of countries with maximum freshwater withdrawals, with water availability declining by 70% since independence. Free or cheap electricity for running pumps have led to reduced investments in our agricultural mechanization, whilst contributing to the financial burden of State Electricity Boards, which in turn remain ill-equipped financially to undertake transformative initiatives in our energy transmission and distribution. Our agri-procurement policies have incentivized farming of water-intensive crops in regions with limited groundwater availability and facing risk of aridity.

Farm loan waiver is essentially an emergency measure. It remains a short term, stop-gap arrangement till credit culture improves alongside rising farmer incomes. Let us consider few figures – indebted farm households have increased from 25 percent in 1992 to 52 per cent in 2016. The average debt of an agricultural household stands at Rs 1.04 lakh, whereas the average monthly income stands at Rs 8,900 – thus, average debt is roughly their annual in
come. Nearly 70% of India’s estimated 90 million agricultural households end up spending more than their earnings, thereby being caught in a spiral of ever increasing debt. In such times of economic desperation, a farm loan waiver is needed to provide immediate relief.

Non-farm diversification is typically an important pathway for empowering especially landless labourers and marginal farmers, helping them overcome the land constraint for growth while offering sustainable income that can provide capacity to absorb external farm shocks and provide capital for agricultural investment. Most of rural non-farm income is associated with urban migration, with most village youth working as labourers in nearby towns and cities. Among non-farm income sources, livestock and construction incomes are a broad-based critical component. The recommendations of the Swaminathan Committee pertaining to distribution of ceiling surplus and wasteland shall help our landless and small/marginal farmers.

Varun Gandhi is likely to be elected in the ongoing Lok Sabha elections and he will definitely play extremely vital role in the next government. Today BJP has formidable leadership in Narendra Modi and BJP is building up gen next leadership with an intention to dominate the national politics. Varun is the front runner for handling the command from the present leadership. Surely with his experience of parliamentary life, young leader will be the key to the macro level planning of BJP RSS think-tank.

Prashant Tewari Editor-in-Chief in conversation with Varun Gandhi M.P.: Inputs from Prakhar Misra Political Editor Opinion Express.

* VARUN GANDHI’S INTERVIEW WILL BE PUBLISHED IN OPINION EXPRESS NEXT ISSUE. 

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