From photography and wildlife to fashion and family, the newest Gandhi in politics has a whole other life behind the scenes.
In February 2015, amid a growing clamour for Priyanka Gandhi Vadra’s entry into active politics, the younger of Rajiv Gandhi’s two children was busy showcasing the other legacy she had inherited from her father—a love for photography.
Through an exhibition of her photos in Delhi, themed ‘Light and Shadow’, she presented her perspective on the ordinary life of Indians—from capturing the shadow of a moving bicycle to a young man gazing into the yellow light of a bulb.
Priyanka apparently took to photography when she was 12, inspired by her father’s keen interest in it. In 2011, she co-authored, along with painter Anjali Singh and hotelier Jaisal Singh, a book called Ranthambore: The Tiger’s Realm, which included photographs she took at the tiger reserve. “I love the jungle, I always have,” she wrote in the book. “There is an unpredictability about it that is just beautiful. You never know where and when you will encounter the life you ought to live—untamed and feral. Everything is defined only by its own existence. Animals are what they are—unabashedly themselves.”
It is only on such occasions that the Gandhis, fiercely protective of their privacy, choose to present a facet of their life to the world. The rest trickles out as information from family confidants, in moments where they do not exercise caution, and it soon becomes a part of the family lore.
This story is from the February 10, 2019 edition of THE WEEK.
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This story is from the February 10, 2019 edition of THE WEEK.
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