Smriti Irani: From parivar to politics
As she takes off her false eyelashes, removes her wig to reveal a crown of recently-coloured hair and slips into a T-shirt and track bottoms out of a shocking pink salwar kameez, Smriti Malhotra Irani is the picture of a woman-on-the-go. Her shift for the day done, she speaks to her husband Zubin on the cell phone, negotiates with Balaji Telefilms' Shobha Kapoor about the next day's shift and gets into the front seat of her Santro, telling the driver to stop at a tricycle shop for her two-year-old son Zohr (she also has a month-old baby Zoe and 14-year-old girl Shanelle from Zubin's first marriage to well-known model coordinator Mona Irani).There is nothing to suggest that this 27-year-old is a television superstar—at over Rs 6 lakh per month, one of the highest paid in the industry—with an army of endorsements and a chat show on SAB TV called Kuch Diiil Se. Even more difficult to believe is that she is the BJP's new wound-up doll. Not that she admits to being one. BJP General Secretary Pramod Mahajan and Deputy Leader of the Opposition in the Maharashtra Assembly Gopinath Munde have assured her, she says, that she will get to work on issues 'close to my heart': education of women and youth affairs. And even as you choke silently, she adds, 'The BJP has a tradition of dialogue within the party. I could not have chosen a better organisation to begin working with at the grassroots.'advertisementAs a 1998 Miss India finalist with an 18-inch waist, Irani is not surprised by her success. 'I was never ambitious but I just knew that I would be a star.' A lonely child who studied at Holy Child Auxilium School in Delhi, she started working at 17, selling former cricketer Manoj Prabhakar's short-lived beauty products door to door. She thought college would be a waste of time, opted for a correspondence course and concentrated on earning her way through life: she has auditioned for an air hostess' job, slaved at McDonald's and even done a Whisper sanitary napkin ad in her long walk to sainthood.By now, her three-year-long turn as Tulsi in Kyunki Saas Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi is like a 'walk in the park'. 'I have done my share of 18-hour days. You set the rules. People automatically follow,' she says. As she administers drops to her baby girl at her functional three-bedroom home, with Zohr writing all over the sofa and Shanelle surfing the Net on her computer, she's the picture of successful domesticity. Just like Tulsi, but with a bank balance all her own.advertisement
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