00:00I was very committed and I was always what
00:03Unfortunately in slang was termed a smartass. Everyone said, you know Mahua, there are sharks out there. They eat you up. It's dirty
00:10It's corrupt. You don't know anyone your father's not an MP. It's impossible
00:14Well, I Rajanath Singh the Home Minister of India come to me in the Parliament Lobby and tell me
00:19You spoke very well, but that was a bit of a mess. You took it from there
00:24I
00:25Was an MLA before I became an MP and I was perfectly okay
00:30Addressing political rallies with 10 20,000 people. I'm perfectly okay being in the assembly
00:35I was perfectly okay being in Parliament, but whenever I come into something like this, especially to a school
00:41I'm actually I think in my head. I'm still 11 years old and I keep thinking of
00:46Assembly morning and you know when the days when we had school functions and
00:50We were all asked to polish our shoes and make sure white socks were just the right length and everyone should have behaved and
00:56We had the check and we're sitting quietly and nothing goes wrong. So I'm actually feeling exceedingly nervous
01:02So when I go in and speak to students or under a situation like this, I feel like I'm quite unworthy of it
01:07And I feel quite nervous. So you'll have to bear with me and when I was in school, I really
01:14Fit the straight and narrow path. I was I used to always study academically
01:19There was my sister and I I was always, you know, my parents never had to tell me to study
01:24I was always very keen
01:25I if I came second instead of coming first I'd go into a complete depression and cry and howl and do all of these things
01:31So I was very committed. I was very committed and I was always what?
01:37Unfortunately in slang was termed a smartass. I do after class 12
01:41Wanted to go to the US to study. I didn't get any financial aid in Princeton
01:45So obviously the choice was for me was to go to Mount Holyoke, which was one of the seven sister colleges in Massachusetts
01:50I came from a very solid upper-middle-class stock. My parents were working where my mother was
01:55I was like my father was a working man and we always had enough to eat and all of that
01:59But the thought of my parents going to drop me or to get out of my room were things that were unheard of
02:04It was obvious
02:05I would study on a scholarship and while I was on campus
02:07It was obvious that I would work on campus to pay for my you know bills. So I got a campus job
02:14I used to wash dishes my first year and then after that as you graduate first year, everyone washes dishes dishes in the US
02:20I went to work for JP Morgan. I worked in New York and London and a lot of other offices and I was happy
02:25I went back for my 10th reunion to my college to Mount Holyoke and
02:31You know
02:31Most of us who had been in banking by then were senior vice presidents about to become managing directors
02:36All of us were earning very well had good lives
02:40Few of us had children all of that and I remember being in Mount Holyoke and 99% of my class were exceedingly successful
02:47but they were all
02:49Homogeneous, if you know what I'm saying, they were all pretty much led the same kind of life. I remember on the way back
02:56Thinking about this and saying do I want to come back for my 20th reunion or my 25th reunion?
03:01Being another managing director at JP Morgan, you know, do I want to come back having made a difference?
03:06So that's when I had the aha moment then I took a decision
03:09I was 30 years old and I said, you know what? I'm not going to talk about it anymore
03:13I'm going to go back and I want to do grassroots politics in India and I literally knew nobody
03:18I knew nobody and they say in politics that you need to have money. You need to have muscle
03:23You need to have all of those things in Indian politics. Everyone said, you know, my why there are sharks out there
03:29They lead you up. It's dirty. It's corrupt. You don't know anyone your father's not an MP. It's impossible
03:35So a polling booth is the smallest is the sort of lowest structure
03:40So every village has one or two polling booths
03:43So what we would do in the youth Congress was go booth to booth and popularize the government schemes
03:48So there are loads and loads of government schemes out there
03:51But most people don't know about after a year
03:54I joined the Trinamool Congress, which was obviously an offshoot of the Congress because the Congress Party didn't have very much left in Bengal and
04:02I
04:03Worked there and I got a ticket to run from the Trinamool Congress as a member of the Legislative Assembly in Bengal
04:10Now the seat I got was the it's called Kareem poor and you can go and Google it
04:15It's the very last seat in Bengal on the Bangladesh border. So my area has hundred and twenty two kilometers of unfenced border
04:22So you have a little rivulet running through you Bangladesh on the other now that obviously comes with its own share of problems
04:29It was I was the I was the first non left MLA to win the seat in
04:3346 years and it was a tough seat because it was you know, it's a border seat
04:38You have arm smuggling you have cattle smuggling
04:40You have a lot of you have a lot of things that normally an urban constituency or South Delhi or North Delhi will not have
04:48But it but you know, it was it was fine. It was a real learning process
04:51I did that for five years and then I
04:54Ran for Parliament and came to Parliament
04:56This time is it difficult being a woman politician? Is it difficult being a woman in Parliament?
05:02There are only 78 of you
05:03There are only a little more than 600 women who have ever been not elected to Indian Parliament since independence
05:09I'm one of a club of 600. I'm one of a club of 78 now, is it difficult and I always say one thing
05:15I said I don't think of myself as a woman. I think of myself as a politician
05:19I think of myself even when I was a banker. I think of myself as a banker
05:24So whatever you do think of yourself as what you're doing rather than let your gender define you
05:29So in today's time, do you think being a parliamentarian is a search for or a way to power and money?
05:35Or do you think it's a commitment to the belief that the representatives were elected upon?
05:41I wish it was a way to power and money. I could do with a lot more power and a lot more money
05:45Right definitely do with a lot more money the amount they pay us anyway, but it is what you make of it
05:51You can be a councillor
05:52I have seen councillors and corporators and panchayat pradhans who didn't have houses who were on cycles and five years later
05:59They've got pukka houses with marble and are roaming around and as we call in Bengal char chakka gharis
06:05Right, and you've seen parliamentarians here each every five years when they declare the assets
06:10They start off with 70 lakhs and after a 15-year thing have an asset declaration of you know, 200 crores
06:16So it is what you make of it. There are honest people everywhere that dishonest people everywhere
06:21There has been much discussion on two famous articles of the Indian Penal Code
06:26You put your book away and say I don't want anything which your mother father's written for you
06:30You say it from your own mind. That is article 499 and 500
06:34It is believed that it contradicts the freedom of speech and expression and what is the article 499 500?
06:41Okay, which makes the defamation a criminal and civil offense, right? So and it obliterates
06:48Journalistic freedom. So what are your views on this law and
06:52Freedom of speech and expression as everywhere else is not a license to lie and destroy people's careers
06:59You must understand this. I'm all for speech and expression, but unfortunately
07:03media and
07:04Journalistic standards in our country have fallen to an abysmal low and I have absolutely no hesitation in saying this
07:10I've said this before on record. I think you know when we grew up we would wait to read the
07:15Editorial and we would wait to read the editorial in the today when I look at the editorial
07:20It's just it's I mean, it's poor grammar. It's it's it's you know frightening
07:25So when you have media ownership that is concentrated and you have strange links to government then there is always a hidden agenda
07:32So I think 498 500 make very
07:35Good sense in a world where there is true
07:37Journalistic freedom and true journalistic ethics in a world where they're hidden agendas and people are using journalists to bring down governments or to malign
07:45People's reputations then I think there has to be some recourse to law
07:48but of course, for example, I gave my speech my maiden speech and I used a
07:54Poster which was in the Holocaust Museum which talked of 14 different signs of fascism, right? I use seven signs from it
08:01I said in my speech
08:02These are the seven signs that I think are applicable to India and I elaborated on each one of them prime-time show a seven-minute show
08:09Which said that Mahua Maitra has stolen her speech from an article by so-and-so in the US
08:16Right now what is it to me what I have people I Rajanath Singh the home minister of India come to me in the Parliament lobby
08:22And tell me I've never a chapola, but what do toda garbha?
08:26So people are believing that what is my recourse
08:30Do I keep quiet and expect it to go and expect blacks and millions of people in this world?
08:35Even if 5% of them believe Mahua Maitra stole her speech. That's not something I want
08:39So, what do I do? I have to file criminal defamation. What else do I do?
08:42So sometimes I don't believe it as something that we need to do all the time
08:46but given the lack of journalistic ethics in our country given the
08:51Great, I would say
08:53Sort of a intertwining of a section of the government and media sometimes there's no option left
Comments