Pratibha Patil will make a good president: ex-colleague

Wincy Chacko, 80, who had worked for several years with Pratibha Patil when both were with the Maharastra Congress in the 1970s, feels she would make a good president.

Wincy Chacko, 80, who had worked for several years with Pratibha Patil when both were with the Maharastra Congress in the 1970s, feels she would make a good president if elected as "she is down-to-earth and has no airs".

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Chacko, who lives in Kochi all by herself, said Patil, now governor of Rajasthan, would "certainly be the best president India has ever had".

"This is simply because she is a down-to-earth lady and one who has no airs. She has always maintained a low profile and see, didn't that help her at this stage in her career," a happy Chacko told IANS.

Chacko was a Maharashtra Mahila Congress worker from the 60s till 1991, when she returned to Kerala.

"From the 70s, for 15 years, I was the vice-president of the Mahila Congress Bombay Regional Committee and at that time Patil was president of the state Congress party in Maharashtra," said Chacko, who in her political heydays had refused to contest the Bandra assembly constituency as a Congress candidate.

Now Chacko is desperate to speak to her old friend and plans to do so without much delay. Patil is the United Progressive Alliance candidate for the presidential elections next month.