Meenakshi Lekhi

Meenakshi Lekhi
Member of the Indian Parliament for New Delhi
Incumbent
Assumed office 26 May 2014
Preceded by	Ajay Maken
Majority	1,62,708 (16.77%)
Chairperson of the Committee on Privileges of the Lok Sabha since July, 2016
Personal details
Born	(1967-04-30) 30 April 1967 New Delhi, India
Political party	Bharatiya Janata Party
Spouse(s)	Aman Lekhi
Alma mater	Hindu College, University of Delhi
Occupation	Lawyer

Meenakshi Lekhi is an Indian politician belonging to the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and is a Member of Parliament from New Delhi constituency in the 16th Lok Sabha.^[1] She is the national spokesperson of Bharatiya Janata Party^[2] and a Supreme Court of India lawyer. She won the high-profile New Delhi parliamentary constituency with over 4.5 lakh votes as a BJP candidate in the 2014 elections.^[3] In July 2016, she was appointed as chairperson of the Committee on Privileges of the Lok Sabha in Parliament^[4] and is continuing since then in that position. Besides writing articles in journals, periodicals and newspapers on socio-political issues, she participates in various television shows on matters on national and international importance. Lekhi writes 'Forthwrite'^[5], a fortnightly column in The Week magazine. With her equal command over English and Hindi, she is known as a firebrand debater in the parliament and has distinguished herself with numerous debates on matters of national importance in the Lok Sabha, such as debates on "intolerance" in India^[6] and the Triple Talaq Bill^[7]. She has also distinguished herself as an active participant in the various parliamentary processes and was awarded with the "Best Debut Women Parliamentarian" award by Lokmat in 2017.^[8]

Early life

After completing her B.Sc. in Botany from Hindu College, Delhi,^[9] Meenakshi Lekhi joined the Campus Law Centre-I, Delhi University for her LLB. She enrolled with the Bar Council of Delhi in 1990, and started practising at the Supreme Court of India, Delhi High Court, and several other courts, tribunals and forums in different parts of the country.

Lekhi belongs to a family of prominent lawyers, as her father-in-law, Pran Nath Lekhi, and her husband Aman Lekhi both have been leading lawyers and have handled several important and popular cases. Her husband senior advocate Aman Lekhi, who is an Additional Solicitor General of the Supreme Court,^[10] is known for handling cases such as the Lajpat Nagar bomb blast, the Vasant Kunj multiple murders, etc. besides arguing in the matter pertaining to the Right to information, 2G Spectrum, among others.

Her father-in-law, as a Supreme Court lawyer, has been widely known for handling the case of Satwant Singh, the murderer of Indira Gandhi and Zahira Sheikh, who was one of the victims in 2002 Gujarat violence.

Legal career

She has practised in various courts, including several tribunals, Delhi High Court and the Supreme Court. She has also practised in a range of forums across India and handled a range of issues pertaining to women in the courts, such as domestic violence, family law disputes and most importantly the issue of permanent commission of the lady officers in the armed forces. Besides, she has been a social activist and has been associated with several institutions, including the National Commission for Women, Sakshi, NIPCD and several other organisations which are known for being protectors of the rights of women and children in the country.^[11]

Lekhi has been a part of the Drafting Committees for Bills like "Women's Reservation Bill" and "Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace (Prevention, Prohibition and Redressal) Bill". The latter was passed by the Parliament as an Act in 2013.

Meenakshi Lekhi represented the media in court to get the ban on media coverage of case proceedings revoked. She was successful in this effort.^[12] She took up the case of the permanent commissioning of women in the Indian armed forces in the Supreme Court.^[13] Meenakshi Lekhi was also the lawyer of the victim in the Shanti Mukund Hospital rape case.^[14]

Social Work

Meenakshi Lekhi has been a member of the National Commission for Women's special committee, Chairperson of the Special Task Force on Women Empowerment, Vice Chairperson of JPM, Blind School (New Delhi) and Joint Secretary of the Blind Relief Association, Delhi.

In April 2015, she was part of a national environment awareness program, hosted by Women Can, a non government organization. She awarded 500 tree saplings to awarded students. The students had been a part of a quiz contest conducted across India through the initiative of Women Can, with the help of student volunteer Apoorv Jha, who published a quiz book and designed the quizzes.

As she was associated with several NGOs, she also worked with Swadeshi Jagran Manch, an organisation associated with Sangh Parivar and from there she was invited by ex-BJP president Nitin Gadkari to join BJP in its Mahila Morcha (women’s wing) as its Vice President and from there her political career took off.^[11]

As a parliament member

Meenakshi Lekhi contested in elections for the New Delhi parliamentary constituency in the General Elections 2014 and defeated incumbent Ajay Maken by a margin of 2.7 lakh votes. In her capacity as Member of Parliament from the New Delhi constituency, Lekhi is currently the member of New Delhi Municipal Council (NDMC).^[15] She is the ex-officio Chairperson of the Commonwealth Women Parliamentarians (India chapter) and has been nominated as a member of the Press Council of India by the Lok Sabha Speaker.^[16] She was appointed the Chairperson of the Committee on Privileges of the Lok Sabha in July, 2016 and is also currently an active member of the Standing Committee on Urban Development, Committee on Personnel, Law & Justice, Consultative Committee of Commerce and Committee of Housing.^[17]

On 28 August 2015, Ministry of Urban Development & NDMC approved the renaming of New Delhi's Aurangzeb Road as Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam Road.^[18] Lekhi, as member of the NDMC as well as the MP of the New Delhi constituency where the road is situated, had played important role in this decision.^[19][20] As a member of NDMC, she also got the name of Dalhousie Road, a road near the Secretariat Building, New Delhi, changed to Dara Shikoh Road^[21] Earlier, she had been instrumental in changing the name of Race Course Road, the Delhi road adjacent to the Indian Prime Minister's residence, to Lok Kalyan Marg thus giving a new address to the PM's residence, from "7, RCR" to "7, LKM".^[22]

Meenakshi Lekhi has adopted the village Pilanji falling under her New Delhi parliamentary constituency to be developed as model village under the Sansad Adarsh Gram Yojana announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi during his Independence Day address.^[23] However, as Pilanji is now an urbanized settlement with no gram sabha or village panchayat, as required under the scheme, she has also adopted the village Qutubgarh on the outskirts of Delhi that falls outside her constituency.^[24]

In July, 2017, Lekhi was honoured with the Lokmat Parliamentary Award as "Best Debut Woman Parliamentarian".^[25]

In terms of utilisation of MPLAD funds among the 7 MPs of Delhi, Meenakshi Lekhi (New Delhi) had been found to spent the maximum amount. She used Rs 2.50 crore out of Rs 5 crore released by the government in the very first year, which was 50 per cent of the total released.^[26]

During a discussion on the Triple Talaq bill in Parliament in December, 2017, Meenakshi Lekhi demanded stern punishment for the clerics and religious leaders who support and facilitate the process of instant triple talaq, known as talaq-i-biddat. Further, she had said: "I want to tell Muslim women, when you have a brother like Narendra Modi, you don't need to be afraid. We stand with you in this fight."^[27]

On the issue of growing incidents of lynching in India, she said that the incidents of mob lynching are due to economic disparity. Giving instances of the killing of Bengal migrant worker Manik Roy, who was beaten up by a group of men in Thiruvananthapuram in Kerala on the suspicion that he had stolen a hen, and a 30-year old tribal man Madhu, who was beaten by an irate mob in Kerala on the accusation of theft, Lekhi told that many cases of lynchings happen due to poverty and economic issues.^[28]

She has been an active participant in the parliamentary processes. In the 16th Lok Sabha, Lekhi has participated in 95 debates (national average being 57.9), asked 378 questions (national average being 251) and introduced 15 private member bills (national average being 1.8) in the Lok Sabha (as updated till 6th April, the end date of Budget Session, 2018). Her overall attendance in parliament till budget session, 2018 has been 95 % against the national average of 80 %.^[29]

References

External links

• Official website of Meenakshi Lekhi