By Rakesh Mohan Chaturvedi, IANS
Lucknow : Pink clothes, pink house, pink flowers and pink icing to top the cake, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati would clearly like to view her world through rose coloured glasses.
Her Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) may have gone blue after its founder Kanshi Ram chose it as the official colour, but pink it definitely is for its present chief. She wore a heavily embroidered delicately pink tinted peach dress Tuesday for her 52nd birthday, just as she has done on important occasions of her life.
Behenji (as Mayawati is fondly called) has worn pink outfits for not just her birthday but all three oath-taking ceremonies, say her close aides.
Though her fetish for the colour is well known, sometimes even her loyalists slip up.
“Last week, some BSP MLAs gifted her blue dresses for her upcoming birthday hoping to impress her. They ended up getting a piece of her mind,” a BSP minister told IANS.
Ever since her mentor Kanshi Ram chose dark blue as the official colour of the BSP, all party hoardings, gateways and even the elephant symbol are always depicted in blue. This was maintained on her birthday too with the state capital painted blue with party hoardings, posters and gateways.
But Maya Memsaab’s house and its surroundings shimmered in pink. Even the 52 kg cake ordered by BSP Rajya Sabha member Satish Chandra Mishra had pink cream topping.
Her penchant for pink extends to the façade of her official residence – 5, Kalidas Marg – as well. Soon after taking over as chief minister, Mayawati had ordered that the house be painted a shade of rose. Her predecessor Mulayam Singh Yadav had no such hang-ups and was not known to have made a fuss over such issues.
For Mayawati’s 52nd birthday too, the house was spruced up in pink. Adding to the splendour were specially imported flowers – mostly orchids – bedecking not the house but also the road leading to the palatial chief ministerial residence.
No prices for guessing the colour of the orchids!