Fun Forward Emails

Manisha Koirala New Photoshoot - Looking Yound and Fresh

There is something about Sujata Koirala that makes everyone uncomfortable. It's not her lineage. Other Koirala women hardly evoke the same hope, fear and frustration. It's not beauty either, though she looks quite striking for a grandmother.

If birth and beauty were decisive criteria for success in politics, Manisha Koirala should have been reigning in Kathmandu rather than slowly fading from filmdom in Bombay. Despite her much publicised forays into Rautahat, the glamorous granddaughter of BP Koirala has failed to make her mark in politics.

For all her intelligence and gravitas, Nona Koirala's hold over NC politics was felt, but seldom seen. Shailaja Acharya was a visible presence with a history of struggle and sacrifice. But she wasn't, ultimately, able to influence her party's politics. Sidelined from the mainstream, both these 'women of substance' died dejected.

Sujata Koirala insists on being seen and heard. She wants political power and she will get it. It's her grit and determination that NC bigwigs find disagreeable, but what they hate most is how she never misses an opportunity to remind them that they are where they are today simply because of the Koirala clan. For those who pretend to be popular in their own right, this must be painful.