The Outsider

if you're a hapless journalist who has to interview maneka gandhi, there are three things you can do, a) hope that you're not subjected to abuse, which can range from paagal to idiot, b) wish that you do not end up as entertainment fodder for her dinner guests — she's a great mimic, c) and most importantly, pray that you're not sued. for even as the tape placed on the coffee table whirrs noisily enough, maneka gandhi, it's clear, is not the world's easiest subject.that's not to say her story is not compelling. an army brat who lived in gwalior, bangalore, goa, even england, she was married at 17, widowed at 23, and thrown out of her home at 25 — her capacity for self-dramatisation is exceeded only by the events that have taken place in her life. no doubt, the latest is her removal, after a mere 80 days, from the ministry of culture, where she had managed to investigate "fiscal irregularities" both at the indira gandhi national centre for arts (ignca) and the nehru memorial museum and library (nmml). it has left her wounded — her new ministries, she says, are no more than sub-departments, without even an office. "i don't know why it happens to me," she says, her eyes looking suspiciously wet. "i'm non-confrontational by nature." and as she sees your eyebrows recede into your hairline, she insists it's true. for her, the quick temper which makes people quiver in their kolhapuris is actually a part of a strategy. "i'm a nihatha woman. if i call up an sho and tell him politely to remove his truck, is he going to listen to me? i have to scream and shout, but my temper doesn't last more than one-and-a-half seconds." of late, maneka has had a lot to be angry about. does she think she was removed from the ministry of culture because she was gunning for sonia gandhi? she sallies, "if i had to go after sonia, i would have done so 20 or 10 years ago. it's just a coincidence that my investigation into ignca and nmml happened even as i successfully sued harper collins, who told me informally that sonia was the instigator of the disgusting filth against the gandhis in katharine frank's book." but why would that worry her? after the famous march 29, 1982, departure from her mother-in-law's house, does she still feel like a gandhi? "do you stop being in the family just because your sister-in-law is not nice to you," she asks rhetorically. and she adds, again referring to sonia gandhi: "in 20 years, i've never said a single thing about the family. one does not feed nonsense or have something clandestinely written about the family." she urges you not to believe khushwant singh who has said otherwise. in fact, the mere mention of his name is enough to start her off on a tirade against him. "here's a man who met my husband twice and my mother-in-law once. he never even met my mother. i must have met him all of five times and then too my interaction with him ended in 1980. in the past 20 years, he must have given 4,000 interviews, 90 per cent of which start with us." by us, she means, of course, the gandhis, whom she unconsciously compares to the kennedys. but she can be — and has been — uncharitable about everyone. her mother-in-law, for instance. i ask whether she got her considerable appreciation of art from her mother-in-law. she does a thumbs down, to suggest that indira gandhi had none. she's dismissive of her predecessor ananth kumar and his "700 unsigned files". she's also given to contradicting herself: in the space of an hour, god can go from having given her everything to "life gave nothing to me". but then it's not been an ordinary life. married to a man 10 years her senior, associated with one of the darkest periods in recent indian history, she's had to live with his sudden and gruesome death just when she had helped in his mother clawing her way back to power. her marriage clearly had its ups and downs. she talks unguardedly about a letter her husband wrote to her two weeks before he died. "he was trying to make up. he said i've had sheds and water troughs put outside the slaughter houses. please, please, speak to me now." she's not had tremendous success as a party politician — her rashtriya sanjay vichar manch floundered, the janata dal sank like a stone, and though her hold over pilibhit is strong (she has won from there thrice), it is not clear whether she has any followers other than her 21-year-old son, feroze varun. yet, maneka has achieved a lot. she's been a minister in three different governments. she lives comfortably in a government bungalow with beautiful trees. her son, by all accounts, is bright and raring to enter politics. she paints her own tables, sings a lot, and has a sense of humour, even if it's black. she has just won an undisclosed amount in damages from harper collins for indira: a life of indira nehru gandhi. and at 44, she's retained a considerable element of her girlishness, including her convent-educated inflexion. it is also true that she's entirely self-taught (a drop-out from lady shriram college, delhi, she completed her education at lawrence school, sanawar). from knowing krishna's 108 names to the scientific names of trees in her backyard and beyond, it is clear that she likes to read. "my discipline of reading came from my husband," she says. "look at how i am, or how our son turned out, sanjay must have been like us," she insists. maneka cares for animals. and she feels "pain for everyone, whether it's an aadmi or a kutta". "i can see only pain. if i see you cutting flowers, i can feel the pain. if a horse is whipped, i can feel the lashes," she says. it has to be admitted that she's had a considerable amount of it (pain, not lashes) in her own life. "yes, i suppose so. but god's given me so much, that i should feel lucky with what i have," she says. she adds: "i'm not schizophrenic. if i speak in a certain way to x, it's not that i won't speak in the same way to y." and though she's given to saying darkly that she feels like she's in a tunnel to nowhere, she sounds hopeful. and perhaps she is a testament to survival. "after sanjay died and i stood in my first election and lost, i thought, what do i have to offer to my country? i had no specialised ability of any kind apart from saying i'm a nice person, this is my surname and i read a lot. so i decided i'd start reading and developed a philosophy about water, land, trees, space, and management of the economy." at the end of the day, she says, "all i'm looking for is some relevance." for an outsider, who's always been at sixes and sevens, it has to be the ultimate goal.