BJP no exception, blue bloods get the royal welcome, party tickets

In the coming Lok Sabha elections, over 10 descendants of erstwhile royal families are contesting on the BJP ticket, some of whom are making their political debuts.

Odisha

In a state where “Odia asmita (pride)” has kept the BJD ruling for two decades, the BJP has fielded two members with royal lineage, Sangeeta Kumari Singh Deo and Malavika Keshari Deo, belonging to the erstwhile Patnagarh-Bolangir and Kalahandi princely states, respectively.

An alumna of Delhi University, Sangeeta, 62, is married to Kanakvardhan Singh Deo, an heir of the Patnagarh-Bolangir royal family. The Singh Deo family has a long history in politics, with Kanakvardhan’s grandfather Rajendra Narayan Singh Deo, who was a member of the Swatantra Party that had many royals in its ranks, rising to become the Chief Minister of Odisha in 1967 in a wave of anti-Congressism.

Sangeeta is the BJP’s sitting MP from Bolangir. While she won the seat thrice in 1998, 1999, and 2004, she lost in 2009 and 2014 to Kalikesh Singh Deo, her husband’s first cousin, who is in the BJD.

Malavika’s husband Arka Keshari Deo was formerly in the BJD. The two joined the BJP in September 2013. Arka is the grandson of Pratap Keshari Deo, the titular head of the Kalahandi princely state.

Arka was the BJD’s Kalahandi MP between 2014 and 2019, while the seat was represented earlier by Pratap Keshari Deo in 1957, 1962, 1967 and 1971 as a Swatantra Party candidate, and again in 1977 as an Independent.

Rajasthan

In Rajasthan too, the BJP has fielded two candidates with royal links. While Dushyant Singh is the son of former Rajasthan CM and senior BJP leader Vasundhara Raje, a member of the erstwhile Scindia royal family of Gwalior that has long been into politics, its other royal candidate is Mahima Singh, who is married into the royal family of Mewar.

Dushyant, 50, has been a four-time BJP MP from Jhalawar-Baran. His maternal grandmother Vijayaraje Scindia was one of the founders of the BJP.

Mahima has been fielded by the BJP from Rajsamand, in place of its sitting MP Diya Kumari, another royal, who won the Assembly elections on the BJP ticket and is now one of the two Deputy CMs of Rajasthan.

Mahima’s husband Vishwaraj Singh Mewar is the BJP MLA from Nathdwara in Rajasthan. He joined the party just before the Rajasthan Assembly polls, and defeated veteran Congress leader and former Assembly Speaker C P Joshi.

Madhya Pradesh

The party’s candidate from Guna is another Scindia dynast and a Congress-turned BJP leader Jyotiraditya Scindia.

In 2019, Scindia, then contesting on a Congress ticket, had lost from Guna to a former aide who had crossed over to the BJP. He is currently a Rajya Sabha MP.

Punjab

The BJP’s candidate from Patiala is Preneet Kaur, 79, the wife of former CM Amarinder Singh, who belongs to the erstwhile royal family of Patiala.

After Singh moved from the Congress to the BJP, Kaur had stayed on paper in the Congress ranks till the end of the outgoing Lok Sabha. Preneet represented Patiala on a Congress ticket from 1999 to 2014, when she was defeated by Dharamvir Gandhi of the Aam Aadmi Party. In 2019, she won the seat back as a Congress candidate, defeating Surjit Singh Rakhra of the Akali Dal by a margin of more than 1.6 lakh votes.

West Bengal

The BJP has picked ‘Rajmata’ Amrita Roy of the erstwhile Krishnanagar royal family to take on its bete noire Mohua Moitra of the Trinamool Congress. Moitra was expelled as MP over a cash-for-query scam, and is facing a CBI and money laundering investigation in the case.

The Nadia Raj, to which Amrita Roy belongs, was an estate that covered an area of more than 8,000 sq km. In an interaction with journalists, Roy, who is making her political debut, credited the 18th-century Raja Krishnachandra Roy with “saving” Sanatana Dharma and the Bengali language by siding with the British against Nawab Siraj-ud Daula during the Battle of Plassey in 1757.

Karnataka

In the Mysore Lok Sabha seat, the BJP has dropped sitting MP Prathap Simha — on whose visitor’s pass the Parliament intruders got access to the House in December 2023 — in favour of Yaduveer Krishnadatta Chamaraja Wadiyar, 32, who became the titular head of the erstwhile royal family of Mysore in 2015. He is the great grandson of Maharaja Jayachamarajendra Wadiyar on the maternal side, and is making his poll debut.

His maternal granduncle Srikantadatta Narsimharaja Wadiyar — who was elected on a Congress ticket from Mysore in 1984, 1989, 1996 and 1999 – died in 2013 without leaving an heir. Yaduveer was then adopted and declared the titular head of the erstwhile Mysore throne in 2015.

Uttarakhand

From Tehri-Garhwal in the state, the BJP has re-fielded Mala Rajya Laxmi Shah, 73, the sitting MP and the titular queen of the erstwhile Tehri-Garhwal kingdom. She was born in Kathmandu, and married the titular Maharaja of Tehri-Garhwal Manujendra Shah Sahib Bahadur in 1975. She has been a sitting MP from the constituency for more than a decade now.

Her late father-in-law Manabendra Shah, whom her husband succeeded as titular head, was elected MP from here on a Congress ticket in 1957, 1962 and 1967, and on a BJP ticket in 1991, 1996, 1998, 1999 and 2004.

Tripura

From the East Tripura Lok Sabha seat, the BJP has fielded Maharani Kriti Singh Debbarma, who hails from the Manikya dynasty of Tripura and is married into the royal family of Kawardha in Chhattisgarh. Her husband Yogeshwar Raj Singh is a former Congress leader. She is the sister of Pradyot Kishore Maniya Debbarma, the leader of the Tipra Motha party, and is making her poll debut.

Their father Kirit Bikram Kishore Debbarma was elected as Congress MP from the constituency in 1989 and their mother Bibhu Kumari Devi was also elected from the same seat on a Congress ticket in 1991.

Kriti’s late father-in-law Vishwanath Pratap Singh, and late mother-in-law Shashi Prabha Singh, used to be MLAs of the Ram Rajya Parishad from Kawardha. Shashi Prabha was also a Congress MLA from Kawardha between 1985 and 1990.