Hundred most controversial Indians in the last century, that's the list prepared by weekly magazine The Sunday Indian in its latest issue.
The list hardly throws up any surprising names. Dawood Ibrahim Kaskar has been profiled by Shyam Keswani, the lawyer of Haseena Parkar (Dawood's sister). And Keswani terms Dawood as an 'impeccable personality, brought up in an atmosphere of ultimate respect for elders, a brilliant student' but finally 'it is only destiny which drives every soul'.
Keswani further says that whatever Dawood is today is only due to the brilliant mind he possesses. He is clear at heart and can't be judged only on the basis of anecdotes circulating about him. The lawyer of his sister ends the profile with this statement, 'Although destiny has driven himt o the present upheaval in his life, I feel that otherwise, Dawood Ibrahim is a personality par excellence'.
Surprised!
The list is divided into six categories;
Rebels and Renegades
Nathuram Godse
Mohamed Ali Jinnah
Maqbool Bhat
Hussain Shaheed Suhrawardy
Charu Majumdar
Shahbeg Singh
Jarnail Bhindrawale
Paresh Barua
T Muivah
Dawood Ibrahim
Veerappan
Natwarlal
Nadeem Saifi
Laldenga
Haji Mastan Mirza
Social engineers
Charan Singh
BR Ambedkar
Bhagat Singh
MG Ramachandran
Jai Prakash Narain
Dattopant Thengadi
Datta Samant
Phoolan Devi
EMS Namboodaripad
Lightning rods
Vinayak Damodar Savarkar
Narendra Modi
Sanjay Gandhi
LK Advani
Jagmohan
Justice Ramaswamy
KPS Gill
Sanjay Dutt
Hinduja Brothers
MF Husain
Salam Rushdie
Mohammad Azharuddin
Osho Rajneesh
Lala Amarnath
Jagmohan Dalmia
Kishore Kumar
Mohammed Iqbal (Sapru)
Amrita Sherginl
Mirwaiz Maulvi Farooq
General K Sunderji
General KS Thimmaiya
Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel
Manipulators
VP Singh
VK Krishna Menon
Giani Zail Singh
PV Narasimha Rao
Harshad Mehta
Dhirendra Brahmachari
Rekha
Ravi Shankar
Acharya Chatur Sen
Sathya Sai Baba
Nirad C Chaudhuri
Imam Abdullah Bukhari
Sheikh Abdullah
Jytoi Basu
Ranganath Mishra
Devi Lal
Morarji Desai
TT Krishnamachari
RN Goenka
Maharaja Hari Singh
Mavericks
Lalu Yadav
NT Rama Rao
Bal Thackeray
Ra Narain
Uma Bharti
George Fernandes
Saadat Hasan Manto
Khushwant Singh
Ram Jethmalani
OP Nayyar
Dada Kondke
Protima Bedi
Biju Patnaik
Subrato Sahara
Mahendra Singh Tikait
Pamela Bordes
Meena Kumari
Trail Blazers
Arun Shourie
Justice PN Bhagwati
TN Seshan
Begum Akhtar KL Sehgal
Rajesh Khanna
Raj Kapoor
Guru Dutt
Dhirubhai Ambani
Devika Rani
Periyar EVR Naicker
Sonia Gandhi
Potti Sriramulu
Kapil Dev
Shah Bano
Subhash Chandra Bose
Dr KB Hedgewar
Another interesting thing is the choice of persons who profiled these personalities. Phoolan Devi's written by Seema Parihar and Narendra Modi by Shankar Singh Vaghela.
