Mrs. Sukhbans bans Kaur Bhinder (Cong I) owes her entry into polities to her husband, Mr. Pritam Singh Bhinder, an IPS officer known to be close to the Gandhi family,
She was born in 1943 at Lyalpur in Pakistan where her father, Mr. Arjan Singh, was a big landlord. She had her schooling at the Convent of Jesus and Mary in Mussoorie. She graduated from Punjab University and married Mr. Bhinder in 1966,
She joined the East India Hotels of Oberois in 1973 and was sent to Paris for a nine month training course in hotel management, in 1976 she moved to the Indian Tourism Development Corporation as Deputy Manager but she quit the job when the Janata Government came to power at the end of Emergency. She secured another job with the Oberois at Bombay but had to leave this one too when her husband was arrested in connection with the Sunder murder case.
She contested the Lok Sabha poll for the first time in 1979 from Gurdaspur, the home district of her husband. She defeated Mr. P.N. Lekhi, a Janata nominee, with a margin of 1,49,727 votes. She was victorious in 1985 too. This time she triumphed over Capt. Chanan Singh Sidhu of the UAD (M) by a margin of 77,215 votes.
Article extracted from this publication >> January 5, 1990
