Mumbai: On Monday, Amruta Fadnavis, wife of Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, attended a gathering of a Brahmin group, the Akhil Bhartiya Bahubhashiya Brahman Mahasangh, wearing the characteristic Peshwa headgear, and hailed Brahmins as “intelligent beings” who did not need marketing.
She then referred to her husband as Maharashtra’s chief minister, even though Eknath Shinde holds the post in the state’s coalition government comprising the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Shinde faction of the Shiv Sena.
Amruta’s comments made headlines in Maharashtra, but BJP leaders preferred to maintain silence, as they usually do when it comes to party strongman Fadnavis’s wife. The Shinde-led Balasahebanchi Shiv Sena, meanwhile, unofficially dismissed her comments about Fadnavis being the CM as a “slip of tongue”.
When Fadnavis was Maharashtra’s chief minister from 2014 to 2019, Amruta was talked about as a rare CM’s wife who kept herself constantly in the limelight with her yoga prowess, her singing career, her fashionista ambitions, and a fair share of controversies.
Fadnavis is no longer chief minister, but Amruta has ensured that the public glare on her does not wane.
The 43-year-old banker, singer and social worker has kept on making headlines with comments and tweets that observers say have become more political and polemical over the years.
“Her statements have definitely become more edgy, to the point that it sometimes seems like she doesn’t take the political repercussions of her words into consideration,” political analyst Hemant Desai told ThePrint.
“BJP leaders used to make some positive statements about her individual identity, but now they prefer not saying anything at all. Maybe Fadnavis has asked them to refrain from commenting,” he added.
Amruta did not respond to ThePrint’s call and text message for comments.
Also read: Devendra Fadnavis gets a mention but no credit in BJP’s national executive meet
‘We are Brahmins and we are proud of it’
Speaking at the Brahman Mahasangh function, Amruta said: “It is true, we are Brahmins and we are proud of it. We are intelligent and we are proud of it… but we cannot market ourselves. We don’t lack this skill, but we just don’t do it. Our greatness is noticed as it is.”
She added: “It is because of this (greatness) that Devendra Fadnavis is the CM today without even asking for the post. Looking at his way of working, his public service, (Prime Minister Narendra) Modiji and the seniors appointed him.”
Towards the end of her speech, she also attempted to flex her political muscles, promising to ensure that a headquarters the mahasangh hopes to build in Nashik sees the light of day. She said she would reprimand the bureaucrats allegedly stalling the process.
Amruta’s comments on Brahmin supremacy come at a time when the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), the BJP’s ideological fountainhead, has been publicly condemning the caste hierarchy.
Last month, speaking at a book launch, RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat said the concept of varna and jati (the caste system) is “a thing of the past and should be forgotten”.
A Maharashtra BJP functionary who did not wish to be named said, “There is no reason for her (Amruta Fadnavis’s) statements to have any consequences for the BJP. She talks as an individual and holds no party position.”
He added: “Amruta Fadnavis was not a typical CM’s wife and she was taunted a lot for being in the limelight. And at times when people are constantly criticised, they tend to overcompensate by doing the things that they are being criticised for even more strongly.”
Meanwhile, leaders from the Balasahebanchi Shiv Sena preferred not to discuss Amruta’s comments about her husband being the CM, saying it could have been a slip of tongue.
A senior leader from the Shinde camp who did not wish to be named said: “These things happen. It could have been a slip of tongue. There is no reason to blow it out of proportion.”
“Amruta Fadnavis has a unique personality. She is not just a political leader’s wife, but has built her own identity with her talents, her social work and her distinct opinions. I am sure she did not mean what she said,” he added.
Making headlines
Before Devendra Fadnavis became CM in 2014, Amruta was known just as an Axis Bank employee married to a promising politician. But, in the eight years that she has been in Mumbai, the Nagpur-born girl has metamorphosed into a socialite, walking the red carpet at Cannes, giving media interviews at Davos, and releasing music videos.
After the Uddhav Thackeray-led Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government came to power in Maharashtra in 2019, Amruta contributed to the discourse on every major issue.
Following actor Sushant Singh Rajput’s death in 2020, Amruta said Mumbai was no longer a safe place to live, inviting brickbats for criticising the same police force that was protecting her.
In the Shiv Sena’s war with actor Kangana Ranaut, Amruta had indirectly sided with Ranaut, though the BJP had distanced itself from the controversy. Slamming the Thackeray-led Shiv Sena, Amruta had said “beating posters of critics with chappals is a new low”.
She criticised Thackeray scion Aaditya Thackeray as a “cocooned worm”, lashed out at the MVA government for keeping temples shut during the Covid-19 pandemic despite opening liquor shops and bars, and indirectly signalled to then CM Thackeray to learn from Uttar Pradesh CM Yogi Adityanath during the row over loudspeakers atop mosques in April this year.
“Ae Bhogi, kuch toh seekh hamare ‘Yogi’ se (hey hedonist, learn something from our Yogi),” she tweeted.
She has also taken certain strong stands such as demanding that the government legalise sex work as a profession, and asking the Mumbai Police to withdraw her traffic clearance vehicle despite being granted Y+ security, saying she wants to “live like a common citizen”.
Fadnavis never takes up Amruta’s public stances with her, BJP leaders say. He always maintains that his wife has her individual personality and he is no one to tell her what to do.
Just once, the BJP leader appeared slightly irked when the loudspeaker controversy was at its hilt and his wife had jumped in.
Speaking to reporters in Nagpur in May this year, Fadnavis, then the state opposition leader, said: “There is one similarity between CM Uddhavji and my wife. Uddhavji does not stop taunting, and my wife does not stop reacting to unwarranted comments.”
(Edited by Nida Fatima Siddiqui)
Also read: How Devendra Fadnavis put inglorious 2019 exit behind him, made good on ‘Me punha yein’ promise