Nafisa with Joshi at the Lucknow Congress office on Thursday. (PTI)

Lucknow, Nov. 5: The white hair may sit prettier on her head compared with many a neta’s but Nafisa Ali pointed to it today to admit what few Indian politicians would.

“I may be having white hair on my head but I am not very wise always,” the former actress and Miss India said.

A voter in the Ganj area here had just asked her: “Why do you hop from one party to another so fast?”

The question was inevitable: just seven months ago Nafisa had quit the Congress and unsuccessfully contested the Lucknow Lok Sabha seat as Samajwadi Party candidate. Now she was back in the Congress, campaigning for the party candidate from Lucknow West for the November 7 Assembly bypolls.

A recent meeting with Sonia Gandhi had sealed her return but, Congress sources said, she was asked to return to Lucknow and campaign as a mark of her loyalty.

Nafisa today had a deeply apologetic air as she walked the same lanes she had traversed seven months ago, canvassing as the Samajwadi candidate and attacking the Congress.

“I know what you are going to ask, but please forgive me,” she told a meeting.

Asked if she would quit the Congress again if the party lost power, Nafisa swallowed the sarcasm. “Please pardon me,” she said. At the Congress office this afternoon, she sat next to state unit president Rita Bahuguna Joshi, who had lost the Lucknow seat by a thin margin partly because Nafisa had split the “secular” votes.

Nafisa had quit the Congress last April saying the party was promoting “rioters like Sajjan Kumar”. She had attributed her decision to leave on the Congress leadership’s alleged indifference to her protests against the nominations to 1984 riots accused Jagdish Tytler and Sajjan Kumar.

Today, she told a news conference: “I had certain grievances based on ideological issues. I told AICC president Sonia Gandhi all about that. I am happy that I am allowed to come back to the party so soon.”

Joshi said: “On the advice of Congress president Sonia Gandhi I hereby announce that Nafisa Ali, who had left the Congress only a few months back, is with us now.”

So what does Nafisa now have to say about “socialists” like Samajwadi leader Mulayam Singh Yadav?

“I like socialism as an ideology but I feel the Congress’s hand should be strengthened to ensure the development of Lucknow,” she said.

The chances of the Congress’s Shyam Kishore Shukla, though, appear slim against the BJP’s Arun Puri who is flaunting a letter from Atal Bihari Vajpayee. The letter says Puri has the blessings of the former Prime Minister and Lucknow MP.

Besides, Samajwadi candidate Bukkai Nawab is waiting to do to Shukla what Nafisa had earlier done to Joshi: split the secular votes and ruin the Congress’s prospects.