Silvio Berlusconi and Bill Clinton

14
15
centrespread
centrespread
AUGUST 25-31, 2013
AUGUST 25-31, 2013
ELIOT SPITZER
Another American politician on a
comeback trail. Spitzer, a former New
York governor, is in the race for NY City
comptroller post. In 2008, he was forced
to resign from governorship after it was
revealed that he visited prostitutes. He
was threatened with impeachment if he
didn’t step down. Worse he reportedly
used a state aircraft for his trysts.
BOB FILNER
The calls for the San Diego governor to
resign have grown louder over the past
few weeks. More than a dozen women
have accused him of making sexual
overtures, including “inappropriate”
touching. He has been called a “sexual
predator”. In fact, his former fiancée
Bronwyn Ingram broke off their
engagement because of his abusive nature
and sexting other women in her presence.
Silvio Berlusconi and Bill Clinton
aren’t the only politicians who’ve been caught
with their pants down. Here are a few others,
foreign as well as Indian
ND TIWARI
In 2009, a Telegu channel aired a short
clip allegedly showing the Andhra
Pradesh governor in bed with three
women. Pressure was put on the old
Congress warhorse to resign. The final nail
was yet to come: in 2012 DNA tests
proved that Tiwari was the biological
father of a Delhi-based youth. For years
Tiwari had denied fathering a child.
The world saw the Swedish monarch as a quiet
man whose priorities were his people, his
family and the world of scouts. Then in 2010 a
book exploded the myth. The authors alleged
that Gustaf blew away pots of money on orgies
and strip clubs. Some of these parties were
hosted by a Serbian gangster. Details about the
king’s affair with the half-Swedish, half-Nigerian
singer-cum-model Camilla Henemark also came
out in public. Worse the king used the Swedish
secret service to force women to hand over
compromising photographs.
For sure, he doesn’t believe in the
adage once bitten, twice shy. The
New York mayoral candidate has
been hauled up for sending lewd
texts and photographs to Sydney
Leathers, a woman he met online.
He used the pseudonym Carlos
Danger. Worse Leathers wasn’t the
only one; Weiner admitted there
were other women to whom he had
sent sexts. Back in June 2011, he
had to resign from Congress
because of a sex scandal.
MOSHE KATSAV
Israel’s eighth president was sent
to seven years in jail in 2011 on
charges of rape. Katsav was forced
out of office in 2008 when
allegations were levelled against
him of raping and sexually
assaulting female staffers. A judge
accused him of using the
presidential palace as his sexual
playground. In fact, his violent and
adulterous ways were doing the Tel
Aviv rumour circuit much before
formal charges were brought
against him.
AMARMANI TRIPATHI
The murder of 24-year-old poet Madhumita
Shukla shocked the nation in 2003. At the time
of her death she was seven months pregnant.
Her affair with Amarmani Tripathi, a minister in
the UP government, was an open secret in
Lucknow’s political circles. Investigations
revealed that the murder was carried out at the
behest of Tripathi’s wife Madhumani. Husband
and wife were sentenced to life imprisonment.
CARL XVI GUSTAF
ANTHONY
WEINER
RAGHAVJI
The latest incident of sleaze involving Indian politicians. In July,
a domestic help of former Madhya Pradesh finance minister
accused him of sodomy. The politician had gone into hiding and
the police tracked him down to a posh locality in Bhopal. BJP
has expelled its leader for six years. After spending a month in
jail, the former minister is now out on bail.
FRANKLIN & ELEANOR
ROOSEVELT
They were poles apart in character. While FDR
loved to party, have beautiful women around him,
gossip, his wife preferred social work. Both had
affairs while being married. FDR most famously
with Lucy Mercer, Eleanor’s social secretary and
later with his secretary Missy Lehand. Eleanor was
rumoured to have had a lesbian relationship with
Loreana Hickok, a journalist; there were of course
affairs with her bodyguard Earl Miller and her
biographer Joseph Lash.