Congress to float Kareena Kapoor from Pataudi against Modi-Shah’s Madhuri Dixit this Election?

Kareena Kapoor Khan’s name has been proposed as a possible candidate for Bhopal parliamentary seat where the grand old party has not tasted success since 1984.

New Delhi, Jan 21: Rumours abound whether actress Kareena Kapoor Khan will follow in the footsteps of her late father-in-law Mansoor Ali Khan ‘Tiger’ Pataudi and dabble in politics?

Kareena’s name has been proposed by two Congress leaders, Guddu Chouhan and Anas Khan, as a possible candidate for Bhopal parliamentary seat where the grand old party has not tasted success since 1984.

There is no word from either Kareena or Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister and senior Congress leader Kamal Nath if the suggestion is under active consideration.

While Pataudis hail from Pataudi town near Gurgaon, their Bhopal link was established three generations ago when Nawab Iftekhar Ali Khan Pataudi married Begum Sajida Sultan. Begum Sajida Sultan (actor Saif Ali Khan’s grandmother) was the second daughter of Hamidullah Khan, the Nawab of Bhopal and last regent of Bhopal State.
In 1991, when Rajiv Gandhi was desperately seeking a return to power, ‘Tiger’ Pataudi had donned political colours. Pataudi’s political turf was Bhopal, a rich princely state had had lost close to Rs 11,000,00 when Indira Gandhi abolished privy purses.

Rajiv Gandhi was reasonably sure of Pataudi’s success as the Nawabs of Bhopal were a popular figure, having given huge land to the poor. However, the 1991 Bhopal election proved to be an anti-climax of sorts for the Pataudi family and the Congress. A few days into the campaign, Pataudi and his wife, actress Sharmila Tagore, who had emerged as a key campaigner, discovered that it was a city divided sharply on communal lines.
That was to be Tiger Pataudi’s second electoral defeat. When Indira Gandhi had abolished privy purses in 1970, the young Nawab of Pataudi chose to take on the mighty Indira Gandhi. In 1971, the charming cricketer contested the Lok Sabha elections from Gurgaon to seek the voters’ mandate against “breach of trust”.

As a nominee of the Vishal Haryana Party, Pataudi got less than 5 percent of the votes.  The 1971 electoral battle and defeat did not affect Pataudi’s ties with the Nehru-Gandhi family. Like the 1971 verdict in Gurgaon, the electoral defeat in Bhopal in 1991 had not lessoned peoples’ affection towards Pataudi family.

The question remains whether Congress chief Rahul Gandhi will convince close family friends Saif Ali Khan and Sharmila Tagore, and the Kapoor khandan to let Kareena contest the 2019 Lok Sabha polls from Bhopal.

2019 is set to witness a large, rather unprecedented number of film and sports personalities in the electoral fray. The BJP, under prime minister Narendra Modi and party chief Amit Shah, is said to have lined up a formidable list of candidates, including Madhuri Dixit, Gautam Gambhir, Sunny Deol, Ajay Devgn, Kapil Dev, Akshay Kumar and Anupam Kher in addition of its existing line-up of Paresh Rawal, Hema Malini, Manoj Tiwari and Babul Supriyo.