Eunuchs lend colour to election

The enunchs set out in the morning for door-to-door canvassing with their band of musicians and singers. For a change, it's not money that they want, but votes.

Published on: Nov 26, 2003, 15:34:00 IST

PTI | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

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In an election where campaigns have been rather lacklusture, it's the three eunuch candidates in the fray who are drawing in crowds with their unsual style of campaigning.

The electioneering is simple, with not much fanfare and glamour. The enunchs set out in the morning for door-to-door canvassing with their band of musicians and singers. For a change, it's not money that they want, but votes. They promise to bring in change, something they claim both the BJP and Congress haven't been able to do.

Asha, who had earlier decided to contest against BJP president Madan Lal Khurana from Moti Nagar, is contesting from Patel Nagar. "It is easier to get votes on one's homeground," explains her supporter Amba. Asha has collected money from her fellow enunchs to run her campaign. "We all have pooled money to run her campaign and buy poll material," Amba says.

For Goja, a eunuch contesting from Mehrauli, her main election plank is she is different from both the Congress and the BJP. "She is telling people that leaders of both the parties have failed people by not performing well. If she wins, she will be devoted to social causes as she does not have a family to maintain," said a Congress leader. And, people are listening to her.

Anita, a matriculate, is faring well in the posh Sakata constituency. She has been able to catch the attention of her voters with her command on politics.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chetan Chauhan
Chetan Chauhan is the National Affairs Editor looking into all aspects of news and features from across India. A Chevening scholar with over three decades of experience in reporting and news management, Chetan has extensively covered all important aspects of the social sector, political economy, environment and climate change nationally and internationally. He did a journalism course at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford and Digital Media training at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He started as a reporter with The Statesman in 1996 and joined the Hindustan Times in 2000 in the metro bureau covering environment, crime and Delhi politics. He covered hot local news, from the Jessica Lal murder case to the rebellion of Delhi Congress MLAs against then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, to the replacement of toxic vehicle fuel with cleaner compressed natural gas (CNG) in the national capital. Some of his stories on air pollution became part of the Supreme Court’s landmark MC Mehta versus Government of India case in the National Capital Region (NCR), forcing the government to take corrective measures. As part of the national political bureau since 2004, he covered important central sectors such as environment, education, social justice, labour, rural development, water resources, renewable energy, agriculture, broadcasting and the Planning Commission for more than a decade producing several exclusive and investigative breaking stories. His specialisation is the environment, having covered at least a dozen United Nations global conferences on climate change, biodiversity and wildlife including climate summits in Paris, Copenhagen and Bali. He also covered India’s two five-year plans ---11th and 12th and reported on drafting and execution of right based laws such as Right to Education, Right to Information and rural job guarantee law, MG-NREGA, now being introduced in new format as VG-RAM-G Act. He has in-depth knowledge of social sector issues. He was one of the first to report on tigers vanishing from Sariska and Panna wildlife reserves in 2004 and 2008, respectively, leading to the setting up of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the introduction of stringent penal provisions for poaching. He has written extensively on the rising human-animal conflict in India and the degradation of India’s biodiversity hotspots because of mining and other activities. Since 2004, Chetan has covered Parliament comprehensively and participated in training on the nuanced coverage of Parliament proceedings. He has travelled extensively across India to cover national and provincial elections since 1998, especially in the Hindi heartland states, considered India’s road to power. He writes a regular column for Hindustan Times, Ecostani, on important national politics, economy, Himalayan ecology and environmental issues. His other responsibilities include providing inputs for edits and edit page articles for the publication, apart from managing news flow from across India.Read More

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