Woman claiming to be Indira Gandhi’s ‘secret granddaughter’ moves Delhi court against Indu Sarkar

MUMBAI: A woman, claiming to be the secret daughter of Sanjay Gandhi, has alleged that the upcoming movie Indu Sarkar portrays the late Congress leader and his mother and former prime minister Indira Gandhi in bad light.

Priya Singh Paul, who has moved the Tis Hazari Court alleging that her adoption papers were “forged”, told a press conference that a “misrepresentation” in the film prompted her to “break her silence”.

“I was shocked to see the trailer of the movie, which is so misleading. In one scene, a man resembling Sanjay Gandhi says ‘Ye sarkar chaabuk (whip) se chalti hai’, and in the very next scene, a woman is shown being whipped in prison and later raped… which is completely misleading depiction of Sanjay Gandhi who I once met and found a very gentle being, and from accounts I have heard from people who knew him,” said Priya Singh Paul at a press conference here.

Paul, who claimed she is aged 48, last month had said she has moved the Central Board of Film Certification(CBFC) against clearing the film. Sanjay Gandhi, the younger son of Indira Gandhi, died in an air crash in 1980.

“The filmmakers have admitted that the film is 30 per cent facts and 70 per cent fiction. But these so-called facts lead to a fiction. This has been cleverly done to influence a reasonable viewer to make an obvious connect,” she said.

Paul said she was “not hankering for media attention” and decided to come out as a wrong impression was being created about her “father”.

Goswami Sushil-ji Maharaj, who claims to have been a “friend” of Sanjay Gandhi, has filed an affidavit in the court, claiming that he was “well aware” that Sanjay had a “girl child”, born before his marriage.

Paul said she had been adopted as a baby by her foster parents and claimed she was told about Sanjay Gandhi being her biological father after she grew up.

However, no reaction was forthcoming from Union Minister Maneka Gandhi, the widow of Sanjay Gandhi, or their son, BJP MP Varun Gandhi, on the woman’s claim.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qh-_gR6a5JE

The National Award-winning filmmaker’s movie ‘Indu Sarkar’ is set against the backdrop of Emergency imposed by Indira Gandhi in 1975.

It stars Neil Nitin Mukesh, Kirti Kulhari, Supriya Vinod, Anupam Kher and Tota Roy Chowdhury. Indu Sarkar is due to be released on July 28.