THE CURIOUS CASE OF PAWAN KHERA--DELHI'S BRIGHTEST POLITICIAN by Mihir Srivastava
- Mihir Srivastava
- 7 minutes ago
- 4 min read
Pawan Khera ran Delhi chief minister Sheila Diskhit’s office for more than a decade as the officer on special duty. Many insiders were of the view that he was more influential than the ministers, and most certainly the babus.
Pawan was good, he’d make things happen, a doer, an organiser, the troubleshooter, the go-to person, and, must add, fairly intellectual yet down to earth, would help people, irrespective of their political affiliations, so very popular too. All the top editors of the city were his friends, and they were receptive to his concerns and would do the needful.
I have known him for twenty years and he was very helpful in getting responses from the chief minister for my varied stories, even when the story would not portray Ms Dikshit in a good light. He would always deal with the situation professionally, never getting personal about it.
Pawan was always friendly with me, though I was acutely aware, we weren’t friends, like the editors who’d drop stories without furnishing reasons after they'd get a call from him. He saved many embarrassments not just to Dikshits but also Gandhis using his clout in the media.
A good story is a good story. And he knows that also because he married a journalist, Kota Neelima, wears many hats, is an author, now a politician, has served as the general secretary of the Telangana Pradesh Congress Committee, and in 2023 was the Congress candidate from Sanathnagar in the assembly elections.
More often than not, he’d be able to get critical stories in leading publications shelved. Like on one of the many occasions, when I was with India Today magazine, we met at the erstwhile Barista Cafe in Khan Market (he would always foot the bill) to seek his response for a story critical of Dikshit’s role in the organisation of the Commonwealth Games (CWG)—2010, held in Delhi.
Pawan was very forthright about his bonhomie with my editor. ‘I had lunch with him in Taj Mansingh (hotel) yesterday,’ he told me. ‘But he didn’t stop me from doing the story,’ I retorted. ‘No comments,’ was his formal response to my story when I insisted. The story was summarily dropped without furnishing any reasons.
Soon I joined Open magazine, this was the time when it was a liberal magazine run by two young editors, Manu Joseph and Hartosh Singh Bal. Within a month of me joining, we did a big story on Dikshit based on two reports, one by a committee set up by the then Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and the other by the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) of India, that had raised serious concerns about her role in certain dealings in CWG. Yet, no one was asking any questions, therefore, appropriately, the story was titled Why is nobody talking about Sheila Dikshit.
I met Ms Dikshit at a social gathering a few days after the story was published, she walked up to me, and said, ‘people are now talking about Sheila Dikshit’ and smiled. I was a bit perplexed, but convinced myself it was a compliment. Before I could hazard a response, she tapped me on the shoulder, with a broader smile (wasn’t a smirk) said, ‘grab a drink.’ We met many times, usually over breakfast, sometimes at short notice, Pawan facilitated it.
Pawan was always friendly with me, though I was acutely aware, we weren’t friends, like these editors who’d drop stories without furnishing reasons after they'd get a call from him. He saved many embarrassments not just to Dikshits but also Gandhis using his clout in the media.
Ironical it is, these are the same set of editors, portrayed as the doyens of the print media, who have an illustrious body of work to their credit, were quick to change colours, switch sides, when the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) under Narendra Modi came to power in 2014. Some joined active politics, and didn’t do well. They were never taken seriously as politicians and lost their credibility as journalists.
The thing with them was they wanted to be close to power in a friendly way, and then share power, manifested as ambition. Pawan knew this need, and used it to his advantage when Dikshit was at the helm of affairs in Delhi. It’s ironic, he now blames the current crop of journalists as the Godi media.
Pawan has become a strong and persuasive voice against the Modi government, doesn’t mince words, and is fairly successful as the chairman of Media and Publicity of the Congress party. He is doing well for he knows the art, and it is not just about how it is practiced but also the intensity it requires. It's a risky job that he does well.
Having said that, Pawan never takes politics personally, and is always convivial, as he understands the larger picture. Despite having done so well, the Congress party hasn’t rewarded him well enough for his contributions. Pawan is from Rajasthan but, unfortunately, Randeep Singh Surjewala, Mukul Wasnik and Pramod Tiwari, who aren’t from Rajasthan, were selected to represent the state in the Rajya Sabha election in 2022.
He got emotional in his disappointment and tweeted ‘Shayad meri tapasya mein kuch kami reh gayi (Maybe something fell short in my penance),’ later tweeted a clarification “Congress gave me my identity.”
The Congress party is making right noises about protecting the constitution and the democracy with the rising influence of the Congress’s greatest nemesis, prime minister Narendra Modi. But all said and done, the Congress party is devoid of internal party democracy, and remains a serfdom of the Gandhi family, one generation after the other.
They are the rulers and then there are dukes, marquesses, earls–they all have a political lineage, and their political life hereditary. Some rebelled and joined Modi's BJP and are doing well. The point is that lineage does matter in the grand old party of India.
Alas! Pawan, 57 years of age, is not a pedigreed politician, therefore, has to work harder and wait longer. In contrast, Ms Dikshit’s son, Sandeep, for instance, who fought many elections, won some and lost many, after his mother's passing is a sorry political figure.
Lately, Sandeep’s claim to fame is that he ensured Arvind Kejriwal lost his assembly seat to the BJP, and he called it a ‘revenge’ and in the process only strengthened the BJP in Delhi. As far as his own party in Delhi is concerned, which was led so ably by his mother for 15 years, haven’t won a single seat in the last three assembly elections, not to mention the parliamentary elections.
There’s no doubt in my mind that he is one of the brightest politicians from Delhi, Pawan is second to none when it comes to capabilities of doing and undoing things. Perhaps, that’s a political liability.
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