Before his name was splashed across the front page of a national daily this morning, Nachiketa Kapoor’s smiling visage was featured regularly on what is termed the ?Page 3? society pages of tabloids. Kapoor, about whom more rumours than facts make the rounds, has had an interesting and chequered career on the fringes of the politico-governmental system, very typical of Delhi’s court culture where a little bit of connections and a whole lot of gumption get you anywhere.
Kapoor, an alumnus of Delhi Public School Mathura Road, was in the Youth Congress’ foreign affairs cell, where he got in touch with much of the city’s diplomatic community. He entered the portals of government in 2004, when then national security advisor JN Dixit appointed him as a research officer at the National Security Council. ?He was close to several powerful people in the Congress,? said a person who had worked with Kapoor.
The research officer posting turned out to be a slightly low-profile appointment for Kapoor, who is also known to be gregarious and social and a good host. His troubles started in 2007-08, when he fell out with former tourism and women and child development minister Renuka Chowdhury, with whom he worked from 2005 as officer on special duty. Nobody quite knows what went wrong between the two, but in 2008, an FIR was lodged against him at the Parliament Street police station for having tinkered with some records in Chowdhury’s office.
But Kapoor used his connections to land another job, this time in the now thoroughly discredited Organising Committee of the Commonwealth Games, as the deputy director general of protocol. However, his nemesis was soon to catch up with him. An outfit call the All India Muslim Unity Forum has been regularly filing right to information applications for information on Kapoor and claims that he had not completed his schooling, leave alone being a graduate, a minimum requirement for the posts he held. A department of personnel and training circular dated 2008 also barred him from holding sensitive posts, a fallout of his tenure at Chowdhury’s office, it is alleged.
While Kapoor said on Thursday that he was ?being set up by his enemies?, and Satish Sharma?who is painted as his prime patron in the Congress?claims that Kapoor has never worked for him, sources claim that the ties are more familial rather than of patronage.
To be fair to Kapoor, in July 2008, not even the most clued-in insider connected him to any horse trading with regard to the trust vote. His appearance in the WikiLeaks chronicles, therefore, is a singular act of fate.