If the showcasing was a trifle gaudy, her childlike pleasure was infectious. Today was one day she would not be denied.
NEW DELHI: Pink is the colour of celebration. On her 52nd birthday, Mayawati was resplendent in a bright pink zari salwar kurta, the glow on her face matching that of the diamonds in her ears and around her neck. This was a press conference with a difference, a birthday party under the arc lights.
Photographers clicked furiously, television cameras whirred madly and Mayawati beamed at the media attention. If the showcasing was a trifle gaudy, her childlike pleasure was infectious. Today was one day she would not be denied.
In a rare gesture, she invited her family to be a part of this public celebration of her birthday. Her rarely-seen father, brothers, their wives and children crowded around her as a large chocolate cake was wheeled in, embellished with splashes of pink — naturally — roses and flickering candles.
“Happy birthday, dear Buaji,” they sang while she cut the cake and went through the ritual of being fed, first by her father and then by everyone else, including family members of Man Friday Satish Mishra. The caste barriers had crashed.
At her Humayun Road house in New Delhi, workers were setting up a dance floor. DJ Pinku Kohli was preparing for the evening. The mikes were already blaring Mauja hi mauja and Billo Rani, revving up the mood.
Her aides insisted it was going to be a very private affair but bureaucrats from the neighbouring Uttar Pradesh towns of Ghaziabad, Meerut and NOIDA had started rolling in for the birthday bash.
A 7 kg cake had arrived and a five-star hotel catering van was parked in the red-carpeted lane leading to the residence that was the cynosure of all eyes on Tuesday.
Compared to the extravagant celebrations for which Mayawati is notorious, this one was modest, she insisted. She announced at the press conference that she had instructed her party units all over the country to observe her birthday as a day for sarv samaj seva.
In UP, she elaborated, she had ordered cash distribution for widows, the physically challenged and the homeless of all castes. And she began the day by laying the foundation stone for the Ganga Expressway, an eight-lane national highway that will connect eastern UP to Delhi in 10 hours.
She also vowed to produce a book a year on the BSP movement, the third installment of which was released on Tuesday. Since the BSP is now Mayawati and Mayawati is the BSP, the series is her autobiography as well.
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