“I asked her if I too could call her Didi…”, Kalpana Soren recalled her conversation with Mamata Banerjee, West Bengal Chief Minister, in middle of an interview on Thursday. Wife of former Jharkhand Chief Minister and now jailed Hemant Soren, Kalpana Soren is also Jharkhand Mukti Morcha’s candidate from Gandey assembly for the by-election. Ever since Hemant Soren was arrested by Enforcement Directorate on January 31, this year in connection with an alleged illegal mining case, Kalpana Soren has taken to public life and has eventually made a foray into electoral politics on March 4. While she has shared stage with INDIA alliance leaders including Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on multiple occasions of united opposition rallies, from Mumbai to Delhi, Kalpana Soren hasn’t met with Mamata Banerjee as yet. But she recalled how Trinamool Supremo was one of the first to call her and speak over phone soon after Hemant Soren’s arrest.
“Mamata Banerjee told me that Hemant is like her younger brother and assured that she would support me all through out. She was very kind and asked me to hold on to my nerves. I was deeply touched by her words. She is a very powerful lady and as a woman she that day had shared her strength with another woman in distress”, said Kalpana Soren.
She had met Sunita Kejriwal, wife of Arvind Kejriwal, soon after the arrest of Delhi Chief Minister by the ED earlier in March, in connection with the alleged liquor policy scam. The picture of she hugging Sunita Kejriwal had gone viral on social media. “Believe you me I had felt her pain. Sunita ji is such a nice woman. She is senior to me but when it came to experience, I had gone through the emotion what she was going through then. A woman understands another woman better," Mrs Soren added.
As a businesswoman with MTECH and MBA degrees, Kalpana Soren had enjoyed the life of being the wife of a politician and being married to a political family up till the arrest of Hemant Soren.
“It was hard to process what happened on January 31. Hemant ji went to Raj Bhavan to submit his resignation but never came back home, even though he had promised he will come back home and ED could arrest him from there. It was a huge jolt. My in-laws were not keeping well and I had to manage my children as well. But there was a bigger crisis in the party and people encouraged me to pick but the fight. I have done it for the people of Jharkhand and I know Hemant Soren is innocent, he has been wronged” Mrs Soren said while adding that she hasn’t cried after the only incident of her breaking down during her first public speech as a politician on March 4.
She fondly recalled how she had sought permission to call Mamata Banerjee “Didi”, like she is famously known as, meaning the elder sister. “I told her I would come and see her in Kolkata after elections. Women are not weak. We are not victims, we are warriors”, she said while signing off from the interview.
