01/5Who is Swati Maliwal and why is she in the news?
Rajya Sabha MP from Delhi, Swati Maliwal is much in the news these days. The reason: Swati has accussed Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal’s personal assistant Bibhav Kumar for physically assaulting her at the CM’s residence a few days back. While Bibhav initially refused the allegations against him and had instead filed an FIR against Maliwal, he was later arrested by the Delhi Police. These recent developments have soured the relationship between Swati and the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) especially during the on-going general elections in the country, and have also brought Swati in the limelight. Read on to know more about Swati Maliwal– who is she and how she was earlier married to a leader from AAP.
by TOI Lifestyle Deskreadmore
02/5Swati Maliwal
Swati Maliwal was born on October 15, 1984, in Ghaziabad, Uttar Pradesh. Her father was an officer in the Indian Armed Forces and her mother was Sangita Maliwal, as per Wikipedia. Swati studied at Amity International School and later pursused a Bachelor’s degree in Information Technology from JSS Academy of Technical Education, as per reports. It was in 2011 when she participated in the India Against Corruption movement by Anna Hazare and Arvind Kejriwal, which was a turning point in her personal and professional life.
03/5When Swati Maliwal met Navin Jaihind
It was during the India Against Corruption movement of 2011 when Swati first met Navin Jaihind, who was an AAP politician. Navin was one of the key members to draft the Jan Lokpal bill during the Anna Hazare-led India Against Corruption movement. Over the years, he worked closely with AAP leader Arvind Kejriwal and was also the face of AAP from Haryana during the 2019 Vidhan Sabha elections. However, work equations between Navin and Arvind Kejriwal-lead AAP have also soured over time.
Swati Maliwal and Navin Jaihind met in the early days of the year 2011 and a year later, in 2012, the couple got married. However, their marriage could not survive the test of time.
Photo: NBT
04/5Swati and Navin: Trouble in paradise
In 2015, Swati Maliwal was appointed as the one of the youngest Chairpersons of the Delhi Comission for Women (DCW), a post which she served till 2024. In 2018, the couple Swati Maliwal met Navin Jaihind made the headlines for publicly having a difference in their political views. Navin Jaihind had publicly said that he would award INR 20 lakhs if any Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) member/ leader gets sexually assaulted by 10 people for which Swati had condemned her then-husband’s controversial remark against women. Swati had said that while she sympathised with his pain and anger, she didn’t approve of his remarks.
05/5When Swati Maliwal announced her divorce
In 2020, Swati Maliwal took to Twitter (now X) to share that she was now divorced from her ex-husband Naveen Jaihind after roughly a decade of togetherness. “Most painful moment is when your fairytale ends. Mine ended. Me & Navin have got divorced. Sometimes best of people cant stay together. Will always miss him & our life that could have been. Everyday I pray to God to give us & others like us strength to deal with this pain,” Swati had tweeted about her divorce.
Since then, Swati was an active social activist and a politician. Earlier in January 2024, she was elected as a Member of Parliament in Rajya Sabha for representing Delhi. She was nominated by AAP, however her equations with the political party are now strained due to the assault controversy.
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