Bharatiya Janata Party leader Maneka Gandhi on Saturday indicated that her son Varun Gandhi's writings that were sometimes critical of the government may have cost him the party's Lok Sabha ticket from Pilibhit but asserted that he would do very well even without it.
The Bharatiya Janata Party on Sunday declared 13 candidates from Uttar Pradesh for the Lok Sabha polls including actor Arun Govil, who played Lord Ram in popular TV serial Ramayan, from Meerut, while replacing sitting MP Varun Gandhi from Pilibhit with state minister Jitin Prasada.
The BJP has fielded Uttar Pradesh Public Works Minister Jitin Prasada from Pilibhit replacing Gandhi.
The party fielded Maneka Gandhi from Sultanpur, while Uttar Pradesh minister Jitin Prasada has replaced Varun Gandhi in Pilibhit.
"My ideology does not match his ideology. I can never go to an RSS (Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh) office. You can slit my throat, but I will not go. My family has an ideology, it has a thought system," Gandhi said at a press conference on the sidelines of his Kanyakumari-to-Kashmir Bharat Jodo Yatra.
Bharatiya Janata Party member of Parliament Varun Gandhi on Wednesday pitched for the release of a sarus crane from sanctuary and reuniting it with Arif Khan, who had recused and nursed the bird for around a year before the forest department took it away citing laws.
The BJP MP has been vocal in empathising with farmers agitating against the three agri laws enacted by the Modi government and sharing Vajpayee's speech is seen as his message to the central government.
'It is 'shameful' to extract the price of 'Tiranga', which lives is in the heart of every Indian, by snatching the poor's morsel of food,' he said in a tweet.
The government should keep the interest of unemployed youth paramount and bring out various policy aspects of this initiative, Varun said.
Modi stirred a debate recently by criticising some political parties for offering "muft ki revdi" for electoral gains.
Gandhi said avenues of employment for the average young person in rural India are largely restricted to seeking government jobs but the government is employing less than before in every sector be it defence, police, railways or education.
"We should deal with farmers with great restraint and patience. In any case, we should treat our farmers with sensitivity and only in Gandhian and democratic way within the ambit of law," Varun gandhi told UP CM in a letter.
Varun, by remaining silent on the BJP action against him but at the same time remaining unperturbed and active, has shown that he is no pushover, observe Sunil Gatade and Venkatesh Kesari.
Varun Gandhi adds that communists always joke with him and say he is a "communist in the BJP".
Gandhi has been questioning the 'Agnipath' scheme since it was unveiled on June 14 by the Centre.
Maneka also exudes confidence of BJP's victory in the upcoming voting in Sultanpur on May 25.
Gandhi has submitted the bill in Parliament but it is yet to be introduced.
Bharatiya Janata Party Member of Parliament Varun Gandhi, who has given a notice in Lok Sabha for tabling Anna Hazare's Jan Lokpal Bill as a private members' bill, on Wednesday sat with protesters at Ramlila Maidan where the Gandhian is on a fast. Wearing a green kurta and sporting a tricolour badge, the 31-year-old Philibit MP came to the ground around 8:30 am and sat in the protesters' enclosure. "I have come here as a common man," Gandhi said.
New Delhi
Is blood thicker than party loyalty for Varun Gandhi?
The move came after the Uttar Pradesh government on July 3 gave the green signal for filing of the chargesheet.
Bharatiya Janata Party MP Varun Gandhi on Sunday described farmers, who have been protesting against three farm laws, as 'our own flesh and blood' and suggested that the government should re-engage with them in reaching common ground.
BJP MP Varun Gandhi, who has drawn criticism from within the party for his alleged hate speech in Pilibhit during the Lok Sabha polls, today met state RSS leaders in Lucknow.
On being asked what Varun Gandhi would do now, she replied, "Ask him what he wants to do. We will consider this after the elections. There is time."
Agitated Bharatiya Janata Party workers on Saturday hurled shoes at the cavalcade of party MP Varun Gandhi after he allegedly refused to attend a function in Nawabganj tehsil in Bareilly, Uttar Pradesh.
A charge sheet has been filed in a local court in neighbouring Pilibhit district against Bharatiya Janata Party MP Varun Gandhi and 12 others in connection with a 2009 case of alleged attack on a police team.
More than 20 months after Bhartiya Janata Party Member of Parliament Varun Gandhi spewed communal venom during his election campaign in Pilibhit, the Uttar Pradesh government on Friday gave its mandatory sanction for his prosecution.
Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited has sent a letter to the Pilibhit District Election Officer seeking necessary action against Bharatiya Janata Party MP.
Lalit Modi on Wednesday sought to drag Congress chief Sonia Gandhi and BJP leader Varun Gandhi in the escalating row involving the controversial former IPL chief.
The Pilibhit MP, who was recently dropped from the BJP national executive, said the struggle for justice in Lakhimpur Kheri is about the "cruel massacre of poor farmers in the face of an arrogant local power elite", and the issue has no religious connotations.
Playing to the Hindutva gallery, newly-appointed Bharatiya Janata Party secretary Varun Gandhi demanded a ban on cow slaughter and vowed to give UP Chief Minister Mayawati, who had jailed him for his hate speeches against Muslims, the same treatment meted out to him.
Young Bharatiya Janata Party leader Varun Gandhi has been nominated as a member of the key Parliamentary Standing Committee on Defence in order to groom him as a future leader of the party and give valuable parliamentary experience.
Varun, the 27-year-old son of party parliamentarian Maneka Gandhi, was believed to have the backing of Vajpayee and Advani but faced strong resentment in the state party unit,
Bharatiya Janata Party Member of Parliament Varun Gandhi on Tuesday said that he had plans to introduce Anna Hazare's version of Lokpal Bill as a private member's bill in Parliament. "I plan to introduce the Jan Lokpal Bill as a private member's bill in the Parliament. I will do that next week," said the BJP Lok Sabha member from Pilibhit in Uttar Pradesh.
Bharatiya Janata Party member of Parliament Varun Gandhi wed graphic designer Yamini Roy Chowdhury in a simple ceremony attended by a handful of people in a temple on the banks of the Ganga in Varanasi on Sunday.
The minister also said one can bring his or her blood pressure down by stroking the back of a cow.
Varun Gandhi on Tuesday hit back at his cousin Priyanka Gandhi, suggesting that she crossed the "lakshman rekha of decency" with her remarks that he has gone "astray" and said that his "decency and large-heartedness" should not be construed as a weakness by anyone.
The Pilibhit police on Tuesday registered a case against Bharatiya Janata Party candidate Varun Gandhi for his allegedly inflammatory speeches on the directions of the Election Commission. Station Officer of the Barkhera police station registered the case against Gandhi for allegedly making speeches with an intention to create enemity among people on the basis of religion. The case was filed under the provisions of the Indian Penal Code and the RPA.
A court in Pilibhit has framed charges against Bharatiya Janata Party Member of Parliament Varun Gandhi for his "provocative" speech during the campaigning preceding the 2009 Lok Sabha polls. Varun was booked under various sections of Indian Penal Code and the People's Representative Act in 2009 -- for promoting enmity and disturbing harmony -- through provocative speeches in Pilibhit.
© 2026 Rediff.com - Investor Information - Advertise with us - Disclaimer - Privacy Policy - Sitemap - Feedback - About us - Terms of use - Grievances