Days after being denied ticket to contest from his sitting Pilibhit Lok Sabha seat by the BJP, Varun Gandhi on Thursday wrote an emotional open letter to the people of Pilibhit assuring them that he will continue to serve them.
Varun, the son of BJP sitting Sultanpur MP, Maneka Sanjay Gandhi, has broken his silence first time after the BJP dropped him from the list of candidates in the upcoming LS elections.
Sharing the letter on X, he said, his relationship with Pilibhit is one of love and trust which is far above any political calculations. The BJP has fielded Uttar Pradesh Public Works Minister Jitin Prasada from Pilibhit replacing Varun who has been vocal against his own Government several times on the issue of inflation and unemployment. Prasada had filed his nominations on this seat on Wednesday.
“Even though I am not able to contest elections from here, I will continue to serve the people of Pilibhit”, the Pilibhit MP wrote in the open letter.
Defining himself fortunate to have served the people of Pilibhit, he wrote, “I consider myself fortunate that I got the opportunity to serve the great people of Pilibhit for years. Not only as an MP, but also as a person, the ideals, simplicity and kindness I got from Pilibhit have contributed greatly to my upbringing and development.”
The Pilibhit MP reminisced how he came to the city in 1983 as a three-year-old and how the people of Pilibhit have now become his family. He also stated that representing the people of Pilibhit was the biggest honour of his life and that he served the people and fought for their rights by utilising his potential to the fullest. Varun is a two-time MP from Pilibhit, which has been a family affair since 1989, when it was won by his mother, Maneka.
According to BJP sources, Varun took an anti-party stand on several issues. Moreover, he was non-committal in promoting the party’s programmes and activities.
After he was replaced by Prasada, reports did the rounds that Varun might contest from the seat as an Independent candidate. The suspense ended on Wednesday when he did not turn up before the nominations ended. His mother Maneka, the sitting MP from Sultanpur, was, however, given another chance from the same seat by the BJP. The Pilibhit seat has remained with Maneka or her son Varun Gandhi since 1996.
Maneka won the seat on a Janata Dal ticket in 1989, lost in 1991 and won again in 1996. She won from the constituency in 1998 and 1999 as an Independent candidate. She won the seat in 2004 and 2014 as a BJP candidate. Varun won the seat in 2009 and 2019 as a BJP candidate.
However, in recent years Varun has been critical of his own party’s Government and policies. In September last year, for example, he slammed the BJP over the import of cheetahs from Africa. The remarks came after nine cheetahs died in Madhya Pradesh’s Kuno National Park in just five months.
On X, he tagged a news report on more cheetahs being brought to India and said, “Importing cheetahs from Africa and allowing nine to die in a foreign land is... an appalling display of negligence.”
Earlier on Tuesday, Congress leader Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury had asked Varun to join the Congress after he did not get a Lok Sabha ticket from the saffron party. The Congress leader also alleged that Varun was snubbed by BJP due to his “connection with the Gandhi family.”
