BALLARI: After the 1999 Lok Sabha elections, when Sushma Swaraj contested against Congress leader Sonia Gandhi, the party was able to make inroads into what was a Congress bastion, and subsequently, the party came to power in the state. Sonia won the election with a margin of 56,100 votes. Prior to that election, the party had hardly any presence in the district, barring loyal supporters like Dr Srinivas Murthy.
The election results were not surprising, considering Bellary was a Congress bastion, but it surely dented the party with a reduced margin. Sushma charmed people with her oratory skills and played up ‘Videshi-Swadeshi’ slogans. “She was a tall leader and people started looking towards her. She won hearts by speaking in Kannada. Sonia won and left Ballari, while Sushma lost and continued to remain with Ballari,” said Dr BK Sunder. “She was the one who laid the party’s foundation here.”
Nizamabad
Citizens of Telangana who were once rescued from Middle Eastern countries due to the former minister’s intervention thanked the late leader for her help. During her five-year tenure as the Minister of External Affairs, she rescued hundreds of Telangana natives who were trapped in countries like Saudi Arabia. She used to take cognisance of the SOS tweets put out by city-based activists such as Amjed Ullah Khan, and then direct her officials to do the needful. Speaking to TNIE, Zainab Begum, who was rescued from Saudi Arabia in 2017, said: “I was sure I was going to die there. I cannot thank her enough for rescuing me from there.”
T’PURAM
Sushama Swaraj was extremely popular in the state because of her compassionate intervention to bring back stranded Malayalee nurses from IS territory in Iraq. However, Sushama’s kindness and humane face were clearly visible when she hugged and kissed two HIV-infected children, who are siblings, at Thiruvananthapuram press club in 2003 when she was Union Health and Family Affairs Minister. The children’s grandparents who were looking after them following the death of their parents lacked the means to support them. And with social ostracisation, their plight worsened.
When the media brought this to the notice of the then Chief Minister of Kerala, AK Antony, he met both the children but did not make any commitment. But Sushma agreed to support the children. “The Minister directed the CMD of Hindustan Latex to provide a sum of Rs 15,000 per month for five years for the children,” said Joseph, the company’s PRO.