: It was at 8.30am on August 23 when Haryana BJP leader and social influencer Sonali Phogat’s family received a call from her personal assistant, Sudhir Sangwan, who informed them that she had died of a heart attack at a hotel in Goa and disconnected the phone. They were shocked and refused to believe what they heard. The family tried to reach Sangwan several times, but he didn’t pick up.
“We kept dialling his number from multiple phones but got no response,” says Sonali’s brother, Vatan Dhaka, who runs the family’s jewellery shop in Hisar. An hour later, the news of Sonali’s death was flashing on TV channels and news websites. Sonali’s family maintained that she was well and could not have died from a heart attack. They suspected foul play and accused Sangwan of conspiring and executing the “murder”.
AMBITIOUS START TO TRAGIC END
Born as Sudesh Dhaka on September 21, 1979, in a conservative Jat family in northwest Haryana’s patriarchal belt, she changed her name to Sonali Phogat after marrying Hisar-based landlord Sanjay Phogat in 1997. In 2006, she started as a Doordarshan TV reporter at Hisar. In 2006, she was a Doordarshan TV anchor in Hisar. She later joined the Bharatiya Janata Party and became the BJP Mahila Morcha’s national vice-president.
In 2016, her acting and good looks earned her a role on Zee TV’s serial Ek Maa Jo Laakhon Ke Liye Bani Amma. She was also featured in Bandook Aali Jaatni in 2019, and in the Haryanvi film Chhoriyan Chhoron Se Kam Nahi Hoti. She was also cast in the web-series The Story of Badmasgarh, Saurashtra.
She was attracted to glamour and found her way into the tinsel world despite being from rural roots. Her father, Mahabir Dhaka, is a farmer who owns four acres of agricultural land, while her mother Santosh Devi’s world, like most women in these parts, is limited to their house at Bhuthan Kalan village in Fatehabad district. Sonali’s brother Vatan runs a jewellery shop, while another brother Rinku Dhaka is a property dealer. Second among five siblings, Sonali studied up to Class 10 at the village’s government school and was still a teenager when she was married off to Sanjay Phogat, a landlord of Harita village in Hisar district. Yashodhara was born to the couple and she is now studying in a boarding college in Hisar.
“Marriage and motherhood did not deter her from pursuing her ambition of acting. She tried acting, TikTok videos, modeling, and even taking part in Big Boss, a reality TV show that made her famous. Sonali was also drawn towards politics,” says Vatan.
Sonali decided to make a career of politics after her husband had dabbled in politics. Life changed for her after her husband’s death under mysterious circumstances at the family’s farmhouse at Dhandhoor village, 10km from Hisar, in 2016.
“Sonali was going to attend a journalist’s wedding in Delhi when she got to know about her husband’s death. She ran back, but it was too late. After that incident, she started staying frequently in Hisar unlike earlier when she would prefer staying at her Noida flat or in Mumbai as she was pursuing her acting career there,” her brother says.
ELUSIVE TICKET TO ASSEMBLY
Surender Dalal, a Hisar-based journalist, recalls that Sonali was first seen in political circles during the 2014 Haryana assembly election. He was there with Subhash Chandra (media tycoon and Zee TV owners), who was seeking the BJP ticket. Sonali began preparing to run for Nalwa in Hisar’s assembly constituency. She was also denied the BJP ticket at the last minute, after INLD sitting MLA Ranbirgangwa joined the saffron parties ahead of the 2019 assembly election. The party then decided to pitch him from Nalwa. Sonali was transferred to Adampur constituency by BJP leaders, who are the former chief minister of Haryana Bhajan Lal. She contested against Bhajan Lal’s son Kuldeep Bishnoi in 2019 and suffered a setback. After resigning from Adampur MLA, Bishnoi has switched to the BJP and is now preparing for the byelection.
Sonali explained to her supporters that her preparations for the 2024 assembly election have been ongoing and that if she is asked by the party for a test, which refers to the bypoll she will be able defeat her opponents. Sonali continued to attack Bishnoi through her online posts, even after she joined the BJP last week. Bishnoi attempted to break the ice by meeting her at her farmhouse in Dhandhoor just days before she died.
Sonali enjoyed a great relationship with several BJP leaders, including former Haryana BJP chief Subhash Barala; former governor Kaptan Sing Solanki; former Haryana education minister Kanwar Pagurjar; former Uttarakhand BJP general Secretary Suresh Bhhatt and Sumitra Mahajan, former Lok Sabha speaker.
But after Bishnoi’s entry, she felt slighted. Ramesh Punia, an activist based in Hisar, remembers the conversation he had with Sonali only two days prior to her death. “She told me that the BJP had been mounting pressure on her to seek votes for Kuldeep Bishnoi’s son Bhavya, who is eyeing the ticket for the Adampur byelection. She had also spoken to Bhupinder Sing Hooda, ex-chief minister of the BJP, regarding a ticket for her to get if she joins Congress. Hooda refused to give her a ticket and said that it would only be granted after she had completed a survey. She was feeling humiliated after she did not get a chair during the governor’s visit to Guru Jambeshwar University recently,” he says.
CONTROVERSIES APLENTY
Sonali wasn’t new to controversy. While campaigning in Balsamand constituency’s largest village, Sonali was subject to a backlash. She exhorted people to chant the slogan, “Bharat Mata Ki Jai” and said those who didn’t do so “are from Pakistan”.
2020 was a big year for her when a clip of her making disparaging remarks about Sultan Singh, Balsamand’s grain market secretary, surfaced on social networking.
Some miscreants shot at Daljeet Sisai, a Jat community activist, in May. Hansi and his spouse accused Sonali of being behind this attack. During the farmers’ agitation against the Centre’s three farm laws, Sonali used derogatory words against them and they announced her boycott.
GRIT AND GLORY
Despite all the controversy she had in the real world, TikTok’s former star was very popular on Instagram with over 9 million followers. She posed in a pink turban and was seen in white shirt, khaki trousers, and a white shirt.
Satish Kaushik (film director, actor) remembers her for being a great human being as well as an artist. “During the shooting of the film, Chhoriyan Chhoron Se Kam Nahi Han, she used to bring homemade food for us. She was a reliable and happy woman,” he says.
Another director, Rajesh Babar, says: “We in the film industry will remember her as the bold Haryanvi Jat girl. She was open-minded and proved herself at every level.”
Khajjan Singh, a Rohtak-based sociologist from Maharshi Dayanand University, says Sonali’s journey in acting and politics was remarkable and was largely achieved with the support of her family. “Till a few years ago, only educated people in the Jat hinterland used to send their girls to village schools. While girls living in Haryana’s urban areas have the right to choose their own career path, women in rural areas have less freedom than those who live in villages. Sonali not only dreamt but also achieved her goals after her marriage and it was largely because of her husband’s backing,” he adds.
LOYAL TO HER ROOTS
Although she may be Sonali in the eyes of the whole world, for Santosh, it is still Sudesh. “I asked my grandson Rudra to call his Sudesh bua (paternal aunt) on August 22. Sudesh informed me that she was currently in Goa shooting a film and would be returning on August 25. During our conversation, Sudesh complained of feeling uneasy. I advised her to get a medicine. When I explained to her that we were considering rebuilding our ancestral home, she said she would wait until she returned. She had plans to rebuild the house with the latest design,” says the mother.
Sonali’s classmate Rajbir Singh of Bhuthan Kalan in Fatehabad says she was a bright student who was drawn towards glamour. “But even after earning name and fame, she would meet us warmly just like the good old days. People would make comments about her lifestyle while she was visiting the village. But she refused to listen. She carried out many developmental works for the village,” he says.
