Navneet Rana.
Credit: PTI Photo
Two independent lawmakers in Maharashtra — first-time MP Navneet Kaur Rana and her husband and three-time MLA Ravi Rana — have been in news for the last five years.
Navneet Rana was the only Independent from Maharashtra to enter the Lok Sabha in 2019. She then had the backing of Sharad Pawar-led NCP. However, the Amravati MP, who had started her career under Pawar, knew politics well and started supporting the BJP and singing praises of PM Narendra Modi.
Known as ‘Vahini’ and ‘Mama’ in their constituencies of Amravati (LS) and Badnera (assembly), the couple shot into national headlines when they declared that they would recite Hanuman Chalisa outside Matoshree, the residence of the then Maharashtra chief minister Uddhav Thackeray and later got arrested. This time, Navneet Rana is the BJP candidate from Amravati. Born and brought up in a Punjabi family in Mumbai, Navneet Rana did her schooling in Karthika High School & Junior College. She took up modelling and appeared in half a dozen music videos. She made her silver screen debut in Darshan, a Kannada film, which was followed by Seenu Vasanthi Lakshmi, a Telugu movie. These were followed by films like Chetna, Jagapathi, Good Boy, and Bhuma and Love in Singapore and Lad Gaya Pecha. She has acted with Darshan, Captain Vijayakanth and Mammootty.