You may have not looked upon yourself as your father's heir, but did other people do so?

Yes.

How did that affect you?

I don't think I ever considered that. I don't think my father ever considered that either. If he did, he would have nursed me into politics long before [laughs]. He never did. But he definitely always encouraged me with my social work.

One thing he told me really remained with me, and I think that was one of the reasons I took this on... I used to keep telling him: Why are you in politics? You do such good work, you can do it even without remaining in politics.

He said if people like you start thinking like this, there will be nobody good, nobody educated who will want to join politics. And why do you think everybody in politics has to be dirty or has to be dishonest? Is your father dishonest?

He explained: I am using the political platform for the good work that I can do. When I was a social worker, I did affect people's lives but that was in a smaller margin. Having a political platform gives me that much power and that much accessibility. I can affect many, many thousands of lives of the people. So why shouldn't I use it for the benefit of the people?

I think that was something that really stayed with me. I realised that if you use this platform for the right reasons, you can do wonders.

Your father's legacy is immense. How are you ready to take on that legacy and move forward with it? There are certain expectations attached to you now.

I agree with you that there are expectations and people look up to me, but there is also one thing I want to make very clear: I will never be able to walk in my dad's shoes. Yes, I can walk by his side but I can never be Sunil Dutt because I have my own individuality. I have my own ideologies, but I also have the values he has given me and the path he's shown me.

You cannot expect the daughter or a son of a man to be exactly like him. Your parent gives you the basic values and then it is up to you to take it forward. That is what my father has done with all his children.

He's never tried to thrust his ideas or ideologies on us. In fact, there used to be times when we used to really sit and argue about a lot of issues. And he used to be very open about those arguments. We used to enjoy those arguments [laughs].

My basic outlook in life is very much like my father's because I want to work for the people. My way of working might be different.

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