<b>When you are the PM's niece.....

When you are the PM's niece..... Friday, August 31, 2001

BY SOURAV MUKHERJEE, TIMES NEWS NETWORK
AHMEDABAD: The men in Khaki are more than obliging. Ask residents of Happy Home apartments on Ranna Park road in Naranpura area here, and they say the police come marching in at the drop of a hat frowning at those who have dared to disturb the PM's niece.

Be it a wrongly parked car, inside the large compound or water flowing out of a residence onto the stair-case - the city police invariably march in frowning at those who dared to disturb the peace of the PM's niece.

Jab sainya bhaye kotwal to dar kahe ka goes the old saying. But what if you change it to Jab chacha bhaye PM to...., they might complete that couplet with ...to roz police awe hain.

The city police, on more than a couple of occasions, has shown an uncharacteristic alacrity in attending to telephonic complaints from one of the residents -- Karuna Chandrakant Tiwari. Tiwari, apart from being a BJP Mahila Morcha member and human rights activist, is the niece of Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee.

Consider this for example: On Wednesday morning Vipul Sutaria, a mechanical engineer with a post-graduate diploma in business management, was asked to remove his car from under the tree in front of block number 18.

Sutaria said he sought some time as he was bed-ridden due to illness. Soon enough policemen walked in. The cops left after asking a much-shaken Sutaria's mother to ask her son to report to Naranpura police station. Sutaria instead wrote a letter to the commissioner of police.

Sutaria told TNN: "When I asked her to wait a while before the car was moved, she threatened us by saying that she is the PM's niece, that she is a BJP worker and can use political influence to intimidate us. She also called me a low caste".

He has also written a letter to the Prime Minister's Office complaining on how six constables and two police sub-inspectors, acting on the call from Tiwari, had harassed his mother in his absence.

Sudhir Patel, another Happy Home resident, says: "This police menace has increased since BJP came to power. That Tiwari is Vajpayee's niece is now a common knowledge. This was the third time when police officials came to solve a petty problem."

When TNN tried to approach another of Tiwari's neighbours for comment, the reply was: "Please do not come in. We might get into trouble if she sees us with you."

Tiwari, general secretary of BJP's Mahila Morcha and coordinator of Human Rights Foundation of India, refuted all charges. "It was Sutaria who refused to remove his car and then publicly misbehaved with me when I tried to reason with him. Since my son was attending classes at college and my husband teaching at his college in Maninagar I had no option but to call the police."

Tiwari accepted that she had called in the police more than once to Happy Home Apartments. "Each time I had a justified reason. It seems most of the residents here are envious of the fact that my father and chacha's (Vajpayee) father were cousins and that we are very close to the PM. They have strangely enough turned hostile towards me and my family. These constant bickerings and my deteriorating health has convinced me to sell this house soon and move out to a duplex which has been readied for use. I want to live in peace and serve the society," said Tiwari.
News Source : Times News Network [ Lightning News ]

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