New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Pakistani sister Qamar Sheikh has been tying him a ‘rakhi’ for over two decades. Monday’s celebration marked the 30th year.
What is special is that for every Raksha Bandhan, she makes a rakhi with her own hands and never buys them from the market. “I make many rakhis with my own hands every year before Raksha Bandhan and in the end, I tie the Rakhi that I like the most on his wrist,” she told India Today.
To mark the 30th year, she has made something special. “The rakhi I have prepared this year, I have made it on velvet. I have used pearls, metal embroideries, and tikki in the rakhi,” she was quoted as saying.
Sheikh could not tie rakhi to her brother during the COVID-19 pandemic years 2020, 2021, and 2022 as she could not travel to fulfil her wish.
Born into a Muslim family in Pakistan’s Karachi, she was married to Moshin Sheikh in 1981. Since then, she migrated and settled in India.
Sheikh claims to have met Prime Minister Narendra Modi for the first time in 1990, through the late Dr. Swaroop Singh, the then Governor of Gujarat. Recalling the moment, she claimed to have met Narendra Modi at the airport, where Singh introduced her to the prime minister. Singh said that he considered Qamar Sheikh his daughter, to which Modi replied that he would consider her as his sister.
“Since then, I have been tying Rakhi to him at the festival of Raksha Bandhan,” Sheikh was quoted as saying.
She claimed that her wish to see Narendra Modi as the chief minister of Gujarat turned into a reality. “When my wish turned into reality, then during a later meeting on Raksha Bandhan, he asked me what wish I had made for my brother now?” Sheikh said that at that time she used to pray that Narendra Modi should become Prime Minister of the country.
