Shehzad Poonawalla

Some Lesser Known Facts About Shehzad Poonawalla

• From a young age, Shehzad Poonawalla was inspired by Mahatma Gandhi‘s ideologies and wanted to bring change in the social and political dynamics of the country, so he decided to join the Indian National Congress.

• Shehzad Poonawalla’s family’s surname was Jamadar, which means toilet cleaner, so it was changed to Poonawalla by his father as it did not suit the name of a businessman.

• During his earlier days in the Indian National Congress, Shehzad Poonawalla worked alongside senior members of the party including Digvijaya Singh, Rajeev Shukla, and Manish Tewari.

• He also became part of the research team of the All India Congress Committee’s (AICC’s) media cell and was appointed vice-president of the National Students Union of India (NSUI) wing in Pune.

• In 2017, Shahzad started having disputes with the party and party members, and he decided to leave the party as he believed that the party did not follow any of its historic ideologies anymore and mainly focused on the upliftment of the Gandhi family.

• In December 2017, Shehzad Poonawalla openly criticised Rahul Gandhi and claimed that Rahul Gandhi was not capable of running the Indian National Congress and that Narendra Modi was a better candidate for the post of Prime Minister than him. ^[1]Financial Express

• He also blamed the Indian National Congress for dynasty politics and claimed that he too would contest the polls for the position of party president if Rahul Gandhi agreed to elect delegates and resigned from his current position to participate as an ordinary member of the party. He said,
  

  Congress organisational elections were a sham since Rahul Gandhi enjoys an unfair advantage.Will you allow yourself to be judged on merit rather than your surname?”

   

• Later, Shehzad also challenged Rahul Gandhi to a national-level televised debate.

• During the dispute, Shehzad’s brother Tehseen Poonawalla, a supporter of the Indian National Congress who has family relations with Rahul Gandhi, publically disowned Shehzad Poonawalla via a Twitter post.

• After, Shehzad’s public dispute with the Indian National Congress, Narendra Modi came in support of him. Modi said,
  

  Congress has tried to muzzle his voice and wants to remove him from their social media groups. Those who have no internal democracy can’t work for people… I want to tell this youngster Shehzad – you have done a brave thing but this is sadly what has always happened in the Congress”.

• In an interview, he talked about his decision to leave the party and revealed that the party had been exploiting Muslims. He said,
  

  I left the Congress party, because for 70 years they have just exploited Muslims in the name of the vote bank, they did nothing about it. The most anti-Muslim riots took place under the Congress tenure and they have done nothing about it therefore it is a challava of the Muslims and “dokhadari” for Hindus.”

• In 2017, after joining the Bharatiya Janata Party, Shehzad became a spokesperson for the BJP  and started participating in political debates on various news channels.

• Shehzad Poonawalla has served with the Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs.

• Shehzad Poonawalla has fought many civil rights cases as a lawyer including the Misbah Qadri case and the Mob Lynching of Junaid in Haryana, India.

• Shehzad Poonawalla is a fitness enthusiast and often posts pictures of himself in the gym on his Instagram account.
  

  

   

• Although Shehzad Poonawalla belongs to an Islamic family and follows Islam, he is also an ardent follower of Hinduism. His Twitter bio reads,
  

  Tweets personal;Religion Islam,Culture~Hindu,Ideology~Bhartiya”