BJP's Varun Gandhi says Jeremy Corbyn, Bernie Sanders are his political inspirations

INDIAN politician and BJP MP Varun Gandhi described himself as a 'centre-left thinking person' in his new book and claimed that his writings prove the 'consistently progressive liberal record' of himself.

In his recently launched book- India, Tomorrow: Conversations with the Next Generation of Political Leaders-Gandhi reveals that he is not a 'rightwing person by nature'.

He terms Britain's Jeremy Corbyn and US senator Bernie Sanders as his political inspirations. These leaders are known for advocating left economic and social policies.

The book contains interviews of 20 of the country's most prominent next-generation politicians.

"I am a centre-left thinking person. I am not a right-wing person by nature. If you have read all my writings, for the last 10 years I have had a consistently progressive liberal record," said Gandhi, in an interview to the authors Pradeep Chhibber and Harsh Shah.

"I have always taken stands that are symptomatic of some desire for progressive change. I get about 10 times more support from the liberals than I get from the right-wingers. I get knocked by the right-wingers many times but I never get knocked by the liberals ever."

The Gandhi-Nehru scion joined BJP, the ruling party in India, in 2004. He is the son of the late Sanjay Gandhi and BJP leader Maneka Gandhi.

He fought and won his first election in 2009 from Pilibhit in Uttar Pradesh, the same seat he represents now.

Recently he said that he will introduce a private member's bill to promote organ donation from cadavers or a person who has been declared dead in the Indian parliament.

The 40-year-old politician said that BJP workers are very committed, hard-working, middle class, humble, salt of earth people who mean well for this country.

"When I joined the BJP, after a few years I realised one very good thing about it was that there was a decentralisation of power. I think centralised power in any form is never a great thing," he said.

"So I felt here was a party where even if you fell out with one leader you could survive and succeed because there would be four other people to see goodness and talent and worth in you. That is one thing that encouraged me as a young person."

Gandhi's syndicated column reaches a subscriber base of over 200 million through 17 newspapers, covering many different languages.

In 2018, he authored a book on rural distress-Rural Manifesto: Realizing India's Future Through Her Villages. He has also written two volumes of poetry-The Otherness of Self" (2000) and Stillness: Poems(2015).