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‘We need more politicians who read poetry, more poets to enter politics’
Updated On: 11 August, 2024 07:35 AM IST | Mumbai | Sucheta Chakraborty
An openly gay man steps into mainstream Maharashtra politics and argues in favour of crafting an alternative political imagination through investment in literature and the arts
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![“In many ways I’m crafting a new narrative of what a politician looks like,” Anish Gawande, dressed in cool whites offset by bold red socks, tells mid-day. The newly-appointed national spokesperson of the NCP (Sharadchandra Pawar) notes how “the role allows [him] to redefine what it means to be a politician, what it means to dress, and speak like one. That’s a transformative journey that one can embark upon when one is given a position of responsibility.” Pic/Kirti Surve Parade](https://images.mid-day.com/images/images/2024/aug/We-need-more-aug-a_d.jpg "‘We need more politicians who read poetry, more poets to enter politics’")
“In many ways I’m crafting a new narrative of what a politician looks like,” Anish Gawande, dressed in cool whites offset by bold red socks, tells mid-day. The newly-appointed national spokesperson of the NCP (Sharadchandra Pawar) notes how “the role allows [him] to redefine what it means to be a politician, what it means to dress, and speak like one. That’s a transformative journey that one can embark upon when one is given a position of responsibility.” Pic/Kirti Surve Parade
We meet Anish Gawande at Method Bandra a day after the announcement by the Nationalist Congress Party (Sharadchandra Pawar) of his appointment as its national spokesperson. “An ideal space,” the curator, writer and Rhodes scholar says of the choice of the gallery-cum-cafe for our meeting.
“To me, politics has always been intertwined with art and literature.” Gawande, 27, has degrees in comparative literature, intellectual history and public policy and is the director of the Dara Shikoh Fellowship, an interdisciplinary arts residency based in Jammu, Kashmir, and Ladakh.
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