A mouthful of venom

By Khushwant Singh ji,
Hindustan Times
April 03, 2009

There is something weird about Varun Gandhi’s fulminations against Muslims and Sikhs; it defies common sense. He used the abusive term saley for Muslims and according to The Indian Express report, used the racial slur bara bajey (noon time) for his Sikh opponent.
It was the language of the gutter for which he should not be forgiven. I refrained from commenting on the subject as at one time I had quite a lot to do with his mother Maneka Gandhi, her mother Amtesh — both Sikhs, like all their other relations. We had a bitter parting of ways and I thought it would not be fair on my part to say anything about Varun’s bad-mouthing other communities. I was sorely disappointed as on one occasion, when his mother invited me to the launch of his collection of poems, I forced myself to go. I read his poems, liked them and gave them a favourable write-up. I thought if this young man is into poetry, he will be above dirty politics. I was wrong.
When and why did anti-Muslim venom enter his mind? During his grandmother Indira Gandhi’s time, a permanent fixture in the home was a Muslim, Mohammed Yunus. Both his parents addressed him as “Chacha Yunus”. They were married in his house on Tughlak Road by Navin Chawla, now election commissioner. I never heard Sanjay or any other member of the Gandhi family use derogatory words for Muslims. The word bara bajey for a Sikh is even harder to understand. Didn’t he realise that it would not go down well with the Badals and their Akali colleagues who are allies of his own BJP? His utterance must have deeply embarrassed his leader LK Advani (who is an Amil believing in Sikhism), Rajnath Singh and Arun Jaitley. In short, Varun Gandhi has, as the saying goes, cooked his own goose. Has he gone off his rocker? He would be well-advised to undergo psychiatric treatment and confine himself to writing poetry.

with thanks :
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