The shrinking of Smriti Irani

In the two years of this government’s reign, no minister has made as much news as her. Ultimately, that may have proved Smriti Irani’s undoing.

So it was that five months after the greenhorn minister stunned the Opposition and, admittedly, even her own party by putting up a spirited defence on the floor of Parliament in the wake of the Rohith Vemula episode, it was time for Irani to be stunned.

And yet, party sources say, there had been signals.

Sources close to her told The Sunday Express that during her last two weeks at the HRD Ministry, Irani was aware her future there was uncertain. “She made casual remarks about not knowing if she would be around for long. When party colleagues and RSS workers called seeking small favours, she told them to wait till the first week of July,” says a source.

Irani also announced several new initiatives over the last two months which officials claim, in hindsight, also reflected her jitteriness about retaining the HRD portfolio.

Almost all are agreed though that the realisation may have come too late, with the 40-year-old minister, the youngest in the Narendra Modi Cabinet, stepping on just too many toes in her brisk climb to the top.

Still, the memory of Irani’s February 24 Parliament appearance is still fresh for anyone who saw it. In a masterful mix of English and Hindi, she named names, wagged her finger, waved documents, thumped her chest, banged her desk, brushed away tears, and didn’t spare anyone — from Congress leaders to BSP chief Mayawati, Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao to Pappu Yadav, a Kashmiri student who had approached her for help to AIMIM leader Asaduddin Owaisi — as she launched a verbal assault against those “who lay siege upon my integrity” and seek to “hang me”.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi had lost no time tweeting the link to Irani’s speech, adding ‘Satyamev Jayate’. BJP president Amit Shah, known to have had his disagreements with her even then, had acknowledged to friends, “Faido thayo (it has helped).”

Irani had by that time left campuses from JNU in Delhi to Hyderabad Central University in ferment, but her handling of the controversies had appeared then to have the full endorsement of the treasury benches.

However, say party sources, unease brew, particularly at how Irani had played loose and fast with some facts and at how she had treated Mayawati, many years her senior. Not exactly known for her restraint, the BSP chief had emerged from that episode with honour.

A Dalit MP told The Sunday Express Irani had made things “worse” for the BJP in UP, with the BSP’s district units circulating the video of Irani challenging Mayawati. “She has no idea what damage it can create for us in the state,” he said. But the BJP did.

As the dust settled over the Vemula and Kanhaiya Kumar episodes, there was also rethink in the BJP over Irani’s treatment of the two incidents.

“She singlehandedly brought back the Dalit student issue which the party had managed to put behind it, by focusing on nationalism,” a BJP MP told The Sunday Express at the time.

Added another, “The party wanted it to be a nationalist vs anti-nationalist debate. Her reference to Rohith and Mahishasur united the Opposition in both the Houses.”

The fact that she became the face of the government for the angry students showed that much of their ire was directed at her.

Around the time of the Parliament speech, news reports regarding a meeting Irani had had with Central university heads in Surajkund, Haryana, also emerged, talking about how she had scolded and played headmistress to senior academics.

“She admonished us like school-going children and told us we should do our jobs well or we could be fired. At one point, she got pretty annoyed when she noticed a few people nodding off during a session. She even ordered one university official to leave the meeting because he tried to take a picture on his phone,” a vice-chancellor recounts.

AMU V-C Lt Gen (retd) Zameer Uddin Shah told The Indian Express of similar discourtesy, including Irani denying him an appointment for almost an year, till the PM intervened.

Irani’s behaviour was blamed for the resignation of Professor R K Shevgaonkar as IIT Delhi director, and scientist Anil Kakodkar as chairman of IIT Bombay, while she became the first education minister under whom two Central university vice-chancellors were sacked for irregularities.

While the protests of a few student leaders could be dismissed as Opposition politics, the BJP realised it couldn’t afford to be seen as antagonising academics across the board.

The decision to install the Tricolour at all government-funded universities “prominently and proudly” arose from that same V-C meet. It was later extended to Kendriya Vidyalayas and Navodaya Vidyalayas, but if Irani thought the Sangh would be pleased, it didn’t prove enough.

Irani’s tendency to not mince words and say things to people’s face had already ensured that she had few supporters in the government. Many in the party call her “Amethiwali Rani”, for her “imperious” ways.

Questions had been raised about the April 4, 2015, Fab India incident in Goa, where she said she had discovered a CCTV camera looking into a women’s changing room. Many felt she had blown the issue out of proportion at a time when the party’s National Executive meeting was on in Bangalore, taking media attention away from it. Just a month earlier, Shah had dropped Irani from the revamped National Executive.

In the run-up to her transfer to the Textiles Ministry, there was talk of her entering into scraps with several senior ministers.