When the BJP in Tamil Nadu released a supplementary list of postings to its various wings last week, one name surprised everyone: Vidhya Veerappan, who was appointed as vice-president of the Youth Wing for Krishnagiri district. She had joined the party only in February. Ms. Vidhya is the daughter of the slain forest brigand Veerappan.
With the weight of her father’s notorious days hanging like a cloud over her life since childhood, Ms. Vidhya says society has viewed her kindly and not as an enemy. In a telephone interview with The Hindu, Ms. Vidhya, who holds a B.A. L.L.B degree and who runs a school, says her teachers and the education system have moulded her.
“If my teachers and sisters were not there for me, I will not be the person I am today. There would have been a different perception. Coming from this background [as Veerappan’s daughter], it was education that has moulded me,” she says.
“The school, which I started a year ago, is a very sacred thing. This is where we can train children’s minds and teach them to do righteous things, like what my teachers and sisters did to me,” she says.
Ms. Vidhya was in Std. VIII when her father was killed. Lodged in a boarding school since Pre KG, she was the last one in the family to be informed of Veerappan’s death. “I have heard so many positive things about him from the common people. I have not seen him and I cannot get into his life and see what is right and what is wrong, what his thought process was. I couldn’t even see his body properly. I was not able to spend even a day in my life with him, but at least his body could have been kept at home for one day,” recalls an emotional Ms. Vidhya.
According to her, she will be guided by the words of advice given to her all through her growing-up years “to do something good for society”.
She says she was introduced to former Union Minister Pon. Radhakrishnan by BJP State executive member Sai Suresh and decided to join the party, seeing Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s work. “Modiji is doing a lot of good things, the nation is progressing fast. So I felt it was the right time to join.”
On her appointment to the party post, she says the BJP’s Youth Wing was one of the youngest in the State. “Led by its president Vinoj Selvam, who is constantly encouraging and guiding us, I am looking forward to working actively for the youngsters,” she adds.
