Rajesh Pilot rose to political prominence in the 1980s.
On the 20th death anniversary of former union minister Rajesh Pilot, Congress National Convener Saral Patel took to Twitter to share an inspirational post about his life. Mr Patel revealed that as a young boy, Rajesh Pilot used to live in the outhouse of a bungalow in Delhi, tending to cattle and delivering milk in the neighbourhood. Years later, Mr Pilot rose to political prominence and went on to live in the same bungalow whose outhouse he once occupied.
Born in 1945 in a village in Uttar Pradesh, Rajesh Pilot moved to Delhi to work as a milkman in his uncle's dairy. According to an account of his life written by his wife Rama Pilot, he put himself through flying school as a young man and joined the Indian Air Force. It was in 1979 that he met the then Congress president Indira Gandhi, who gave him a ticket to contest elections. Mr Pilot quit the air force and contested elections, winning first from Bharatpur and then from Dausa in Rajasthan. As a member of the Congress party, he also served as minister for Telecommunications, Internal Security and Environment at various points.
In his Twitter post, Mr Patel paid his tributes to the man who went from delivering milk to becoming a union minister. "10-year-old boy lived in outhouse of a bungalow at 112 GRG road, used to take care of cattle & deliver milk to surrounding areas," he wrote. "Years later that boy became minister & lived in the same bungalow!"
His son Sachin Pilot, Deputy Chief Minister of Rajasthan, also took to social media today to pay his tributes to the late Congress leader.
"Paid homage to my late father at his samadhi in Dausa,where he breathed his last this day 20 years ago," he wrote. "I can feel his presence everyday. I miss him everyday."
In a separate post, he also shared two photos of his father.
Rajesh Pilot died in a car accident on June 11, 2000, in his Lok Sabha constituency of Dausa.
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