10 Things You Probably Don’t Know About Priyanka Gandhi

You probably don’t know most of these facts about Priyanka Gandhi. Tell us which ones you knew!

The Congress announced that Rahul Gandhi’s sister Priyanka Gandhi would be the party’s general secretary in charge of eastern Uttar Pradesh.

(Photo: The Quint)

The race for 2019 elections just heated up and in a big way! The Congress announced that Rahul Gandhi’s sister Priyanka Gandhi would be the party’s general secretary in charge of eastern Uttar Pradesh. There's much that we don't know about Priyanka. Here's a quick list of ten things you absolutely must know about Priyanka Gandhi.

Listen to the podcast as we walk you through her journey:

Childhood & Schooling

• Priyanka Gandhi was born on 12 January 1972 to Sonia and Rajiv Gandhi in Delhi. She is a little under two years younger than her brother and Congress President Rahul Gandhi.
• Priyanka Gandhi studied in Modern School, Convent of Jesus and Mary, and is a graduate in Psychology from the University of Delhi. She completed her masters in Buddhist Studies in 2010.
• After her grandmother and former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi’s assassination, Priyanka Gandhi had to drop her studies and was home schooled, almost always surrounded by high security.
• Priyanka learned Hindi from Teji Bachchan, Amitabh Bachchan's mother. As confirmed by sources, much of her Hindi-speaking and her vocabulary, is heavily influenced by her lessons from Teji.

Family Life & Political Past

• Priyanka Gandhi is married to businessman Robert Vadra. The two were married at the residence of the Gandhi family at 10 Janpath on 18 February 1997.

Media reports have raised allegations of fraud against Vadra to the tune of crores of rupees in an alleged land scam with the DLF group, one of India’s leading realty firms. Vadra’s alleged fraud has been the subject of many an attack against the Congress party.

• Priyanka has said in the past that she has no inclination towards politics. Apart from being one of Rahul Gandhi’s key advisors, she also campaigned for the Rahul Gandhi-Akhilesh Yadav alliance in her mother’s constituency Raebareli, ahead of the 2017 Uttar Pradesh elections. In the 2004 general elections, she was her mother's campaign manager and helped oversee Rahul Gandhi's campaign.
• She may not have had an interest in politics earlier but she’s no stranger to public speaking. She reportedly delivered her first public speech when she was 16 years old.
• Priyanka Gandhi has two children – son Raihan and daughter Miraya. According to them, Priyanka is QUITE the disciplinarian, but on a lighter note, she’s supposedly an excellent baker as well, and bakes delicious brownies.

Spirituality & Welfare Work

• Priyanka is an ardent follower of Buddhism. She is also a practitioner of Vipassana, a spiritual practice taught by SN Goenka.
• Priyanka is trustee and member of the executive committee of the family-run Rajiv Gandhi Foundation. The foundation is involved in several social-welfare efforts and initiatives in Raebareli and Amethi.

(With inputs from NDTV and Money Control.)