Draped in a pink chiffon sari,she emerges from the porch of her ancestral house,16 Civil Lines,Jaipur,lying across the Rajasthan Governor and Chief Ministers official residence. A group of overawed teenagers from Rajasthan University crowd around her and one of them quips,Rajkumari will just have to shift across the road. Others laugh. She blushes. It is a bright sunny October morning,an auspicious one,particularly so for the erstwhile Jaipur royal family scion. Diya Kumari is heading for a small puja and inauguration of a new office,from where she hopes to steer her plunge into politics for the Assembly elections in Rajasthan. With hundreds of supporters and party workers waiting on her daily,the move out of the City Palace was inevitable. Ever since she was inducted into the BJP by prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi in Jaipur in early September,Diyas team of media managers have had their hands full with a slew of requests for interviews,photo shoots and appointments. Her diary that used to be choc-a-bloc with social engagements has seen an increasing shift to political work and to,what she calls,more socially relevant work. Born in New Delhi,Diya says she had a normal childhood with her father,Brigadier Bhawani Singh,who served in the Indian Army. I stayed in the Army quarters in Nasirabad and Udaipur,and in Delhi,we had a simple flat. It was only in Jaipur during vacations that I experienced the palace life. I am just as much a commoner as anyone else, she insists. She went to Modern School,Barakhamba Road,in Delhi and completed high school from Maharani Gayatri Devi Girls School in Jaipur. Later,she pursued a decorative arts course in London and came back to work closely with the local community around the City Palace. It helped that the family has a number of hotels and museums that needed looking after. The Princess Diya Foundation runs Palace School and Maharaja Sawai Bhawani Singh School,as well as manages hotels across the state. Besides,Diya runs an NGO and works for empowerment of women. She is also mother to Padmanabh (15),Gauravi (14) and Lakshyaraj (10). Diya admits politics rarely entered her mind space till former chief minister Vasundhara Raje first proposed the idea. It was an idea that was nurtured for months before I was sure I would take up the responsibility. So many friends warned,If you enter politics,you will get into dirt. But I consulted my mother (Padmini Devi),my husband (Narendra Singh) and my children. They are the ones who will have to support me and they were very enthusiastic, she says. Now she talks like a seasoned politician. It is important to give politics a shot, Diya stresses. If everyone stays away calling it a dirty business,there will never be change. Diya has been given a ticket by the BJP from Sawai Madhopur,where the Jaipur royal family holds ancestral properties. The seat is tricky as the socially backward Meena community holds sway here. Diya will be facing both former minister Bhanwarlal Sharma of the Congress as well as challenge from the Kirori Lal Meena camp. She was earlier expected to get a ticket from Hawamahal,where the City Palace is located and where the 42-year-old has been actively engaged with the local community. While her father Bhawani Singh,who contested on a Congress ticket from Jaipur in the parliamentary elections of 1989,had to face defeat,Diya feels she is far better placed. My father was very close to Rajiv Gandhi,who called him up just a day before the nominations and asked him to contest. He was a very simple person and couldnt say no. He had to lose because of the anti-Congress wave then. Times have changed and the Congress in Rajasthan is no longer a progressive party, she says. Also,she adds,I am more worldly-wise than him. Diya goes on to praise Raje and Modi as an inspiration. People are unhappy with the inefficiency of the government,corruption,infrastructure and health issues. I feel every politician should have a report card and their work too should be rated. The age of conventional politics and politicians is long gone. Diya at least cant be accused of falling in that category,making time to read Jhumpa Lahiris latest,giving interviews to international lifestyle magazines,inaugurating art exhibitions,hosting celebrities at the City Palace and rushing to the railway station to receive her children from the boarding school,even as she visits hospitals to meet rape victims,braves the scorching sun to sit on dharnas,and holds meetings with senior leaders. The local media likened her to step-grandmother and three-time MP Rajmata Gayatri Devi recently when Diya sat on the same demonstration spot and for the same cause that the Rajmata had been fighting for in 2008. Diya joined the students of Maharaja Sawai Man Singh Vidyalaya and residents of Sanjay Nagar Basti to protest against transfer of land by the Jaipur Development Authority to a builder for high-rises at Moti Doongri. The land had been donated by the royal family for a park. The transition to a common commoner isnt so easy it seems. Diya claims she was always conscious of being called Princess or Rajkumari. She says one of her most embarrassing moments was to find it written on her voter identity card. I made sure my passport did not have it. Recently while making my Aadhar card too I insisted they dont write Princess there. However,a small black nameplate with sparkling sequins gifted to her on her first day in her new office boasted the title unabashedly Princess Diya Kumari,it said. Diya,after all,accepts why the two go hand in hand. Asserting she will win,she says: I have an edge over others because everyone knows my family and what it has done for the people here.
