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t the age of five, Vijay Darda had decided that he wanted to be a hockey player like the legendary Dhyan Chand and bring fame and glory to his country. In the following four decades his
sporting spirit remains unchanged, but the gameplan has changed. Far away from the dusty football fields of Yavatmal in north eastern Maharashtra, Darda, 51, spends most of his time in the upper house of the Parliament and at his newspaper office in Nagpur.
The son of prominent Congress leader and freedom fighter, the late Shri Jawaharlal Darda, Vijay Darda grew up in an environment charged with patriotic fervour and political debates. "My childhood memories are of my mother cooking for hordes of people ranging from simple villagers to political leaders, all of whom came to meet my father."
Jawaharlal Darda was a Congress minister in the Maharashtra Cabinet for nearly 22 years. He founded the Lokmat group of publications, which has today grown into a leading chain of newspapers in the state with multi-editions. Vijay Darda finds himself following in his father's footsteps, but it has happened without him consciously wanting to do so.
"I never wanted to be a politician and I never imagined I would be in the newspaper business. In my youth, my only desire was to be a sportsman. The newspaper business was a legacy and today I cannot imagine a life without Lokmat. And politics, you could say, is in my blood. My career as a minister is on a parallel course with my publishing career, as my priority is the welfare of the newspaper industry."
Darda's mother, Veena Devi, was against the involvement of her sons in politics. First it was Rajendra, the younger son who fought for the state assembly elections. But he withdrew from active politics after losing his candidacy. When Darda told his mother about his wish to enter politics, she was not too happy, but she suggested that if that's what he'd set his heart on, he should be a Congress candidate, since that was the party the family identified with closely.
Unfortunately for Darda, Sonia Gandhi, the Congress President, chose some other candidate over Darda for the 1998 Rajya Sabha elections.
Undeterred, he decided to fight as an independent candidate with the encouragement of friends like Rajya Sabha MP, Mukesh Patel. The summer of 1998 saw Darda snatch a spectacular victory from Congress candidate and former Union home secretary, Ram Pradhan, in a complete reversal of poll fortunes.
The election had its share of drama. The Congress accused Sharad Pawar, the former Congress leader and founder of the rebel group National
ist Congress Party, of manipulating the defeat of Ram Pradhan by supporting Darda.
This election led to the first stirrings of political ambition in Darda and he put in a great amount of effort to woo a host of independent MLAs who were undecided between voting for the Congress or the BJP-Shiv Sena.
"I was, in a way lucky, to be caught in the crossfire between Sharad Pawar and the Congress and I got a lot of votes which I may not have got if Pawar had not supported me," says Darda.
But his campaigning skills had been tested while he was still in school, when Yavatmal colleges, which were affiliated to the Nagpur University, used Darda's skills to get Yavatmal students elected to the Student's Council.
"I was still in school when college union leaders began approaching me to help them rally for votes in Nagpur colleges."
That's because, talking to people, winning their trust is an extension of Darda's gregarious self. Even as a child, Darda never let the fact that he belonged to one of the most pre-eminent and famed families in the entire Vidarbha region, go to his head.
His father, Jawaharlal Darda was a legend in the region and his house in Yavatmal was visited by political greats like Jawaharlal Nehru, Rajendra Prasad, Indira Gandhi and a host of other leaders.
But his parents made sure that their sons had a normal upbringing. The boys went to a municipal school while their sisters studied in a convent school in Mumbai. The boys travelled in ordinary second class compartments in trains while the rest of the family went first class, and they walked to school because they did not have money to take a bus.
They received two sets of new clothes every year for Diwali. It was simplicity on the verge of austerity. "I never felt deprived because all my friends in school came from low income families. I was no different from them."
He continues, "My mother comes from a staunch Jain family and I have learnt the basic tenets of Jainism from my mother and my maternal uncle." A few years ago, Darda met a Jain sadhvi, Pritisudhaji at Chandrapur, near Nagpur. "I was mesmerised by her sermon. It did not seem like a religious discourse for she explained the teachings of Lord Mahavir through simple stories. I try to lead my life on the basis of ekta akhandta, samadharma aur sambhav (unity, secularism and peaceful co-existence)."
Darda, later, organised a huge samskar yagna for Pritisudhaji at Nagpur, which continued for some weeks. "It was a memorable event," remembers Darda. "Although I do not actively practice my religion, whenever there is an opportunity for spiritual enhancement I make the most of it." He used to watch his father from a distance,
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