The BJP MP Kangana Ranaut’s speeches and interviews have one clear theme: every setting is an opportunity to praise PM Narendra Modi.
The first-time MP from Himachal’s Mandi, used the floor of the Lok Sabha on Wednesday to push the theme further.
“Let me tell the Congress people that the Prime Minister does not hack EVMs, he has hacked the people’s hearts,” Kangana told the Lok Sabha during a debate on electoral reforms that featured one of the pet issues of India’s leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi, “vote theft”.
Kangana has dismissed the charges that Rahul has been repeating both inside and outside the Parliament for over a year now.
Kangana told the fellow MPs in the Lok Sabha she had expected a “grand revelation” from the leader of Opposition, but it came as a grand thud. The Gandhi siblings, Rahul and Priyanka, and their mother Sonia, the first-time MP said, have always been “steeped in entitlement”.
Speaking at the debate on Tuesday, Rahul had referred to a Brazilian model whose photographs under different names had appeared 22 times in the electoral rolls in Haryana.
“A Brazilian woman appeared 22 times in the Haryana voter list. Another woman’s name appeared 200 times. The Haryana election was stolen. I have said this again and again and again. But the Election Commission hasn’t answered my questions,” Rahul said on Tuesday.
As Rahul mentioned the name of the Brazilian woman, a hair-stylist from a little known town in Brazil, Congress MPs seated behind the leader of Opposition had flashed her photograph inside the Parliament.
Kangana apologised to Larissa Nery in the Parliament.
“As a woman, I want to say every woman is entitled to her dignity,” she said. “Yet they flashed her image without any evidence. That is a violation of personal rights. On behalf of this House, I apologise to her.”
Kangana also explained, without mentioning the name Larissa Nery, that she had clarified many times that she had never visited India.
Soon after the controversy broke last month, a day before the first phase of polling in Bihar, Larissa had clarified that she was unaware of her photograph being used in India.
She urged the MPs to consider the contrast between the Opposition, flashing images of a woman inside the House to the women-friendly schemes launched by the Modi government since its first term.
In her first year as an MP, Kangana has chosen to be the leading cheerleader for the prime minister.
This year in August she told the women’s magazine Hautterfly, Modi was the biggest feminist she had ever met.
“There are so many things. He is truly the biggest feminist I have seen. Also he has never shown off that he has done these many things for women. He is a silent feminist.”
During a public event in her home state, Himachal, Kangana had referred to Modi as “God incarnate.”
At a fashion event in October, Kangana called Modi the ultimate showstopper.
“Our Prime Minister. He can definitely. He has got great style. And he’s very aware. Not just politically, but socially. And he cares a great deal about Indian industries and Indian people. So, I think he would be a great showstopper,” Kangana had said.
If the Union government ever introduces an award for Most Consistent Public Devotion, they won’t have to look far. The Mandi MP is most likely to top the list.
