Vinod Khanna, the king of bridges, had admirers across isles

While preparing for the 1998 general elections, the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) under L K Advani and Atal Bihari Vajpayee combine had announced candidates for 12 Lok Sabha seats in Punjab, but had left one seat for guessing. The suspense was becoming too long, till just a day ahead of the final day of filing nominations, Bollywood actor Vinod Khanna flaked by Advani and the late Pramod Mahajan, appeared in the BJP Headquarters. Advani while announcing his candidature even didn’t mention the constituency he would contest. “Only one constituency is left unannounced. Use your acumen,” came a cryptic reply from Advani. Since then Khanna represented border seat of Gurdaspur, barring in 2009, when he lost. He was inducted into the cabinet as Union Minister for Culture and Tourism in July 2002, but six months later, he was moved to as Minister of State in the crucial Ministry of External Affairs (MEA).

If Mumbai made Vinod Khanna a star, Punjab turned him a politician. People in his constancy recall him as ‘Pulon ka Raja’ – the King of Bridges’. He worked on building a dozen major and minor bridges on river Beas, Ravi and Ujh that connected Gurdaspur with …read more