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Bangalore, Jul 6: ‘Simple' and `S Suresh Kumar' are almost synonyms in the state's political circles. Here's a man whose first exposure to an aeroplane was at the High Grounds police station than 30,000 ft above the ground. He was given the infamous aeroplane treatment by the police for gate-crashing a high-level Commonwealth meeting at Hotel Ashok during the Emergency and letting the foreign delegates know the exact state of affairs then.

A humble cycle was his faithful companion for the longest time. When he became a legislator, the grandest switch he would make was to a scooter. He would then joke that when other legislators paged for their cars at Vidhana Soudha, he was trekking to the scooter stand. Only on the advice of his doctor after he started suffering from spondylitis did he purchase a car, a second-hand one at that. In these days of crorepati netas who think nothing of flaunting their flashy SUVs and designer glasses, Suresh harks back to a bygone era of politics being public service.

A law and urban development minister today, he remains the quintessential neta next door. Though he has yet to set foot on foreign soil, he's a member of BJP's think tank and chief minister B S Yeddyurappa's "dependable man'' in and out of the legislature.

A cent per cent Bangalorean, Suresh did his primary and high school education at Malleswaram and graduated with a BSc from MES College in Malleswaram. "Badminton ace Prakash Padukone was my schoolmate. I don't think he remembers me now,'' he says modestly. A good swimmer and an athlete -- the javelin throw used to be his favourite event -- in his student days, he admits to being a very serious student.

Suresh's association with the RSS started very early. He joined the organisation when he was in the fourth standard and that paved the way for his political innings."I didn't join this party; rather I was born in this party,'' he says.

Unlike most netas whose marriages are arranged, he married the girl he fell in love with. It was a closely guarded affair with Savithri and even the marriage was a low-key event. "I laid down this condition to my mother that the wedding should be a simple affair without printed invitation cards. It was a simple Arya Samaj marriage,'' he recalls.

Savithri, now resident editor of a Kannada daily, was a Akhila Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) activist when she met Suresh, then in the RSS. "Our thinking was identical and it was easy for us to know each other. Besides, I knew Suresh's mother well,'' says Savithri.

As for balancing family life, politics and career, she takes permission from the office during elections to canvass for her husband. Though the couple has never watched a movie together, they always take time off for a holiday on their wedding anniversary every year. Daughter Disha, who is studying medicine, is as simple and level-headed as her parents and thinks Suresh and Savithri are more friends than parents.

Suresh's involvement in underground activities protesting against the Emergency in 1975 landed him in jail for 15 months. It was his talk "on the ill effects'' of the Emergency to Commonwealth country delegates at Hotel Ashok that made the party top brass spot his leadership potential. "The government convinced delegates that the situation here was normal. Though there was heavy security in the hotel, I gave the police the slip and entered the bus in which the delegates were about to go to Mysore, and explained that all was not well in the country due to the Emergency,'' he recalls.

For this daring act, Suresh was taken to the High Grounds police station and subjected to torture. Today, he laughs it off, "I had heard of the aeroplane treatment the police used to extract information and I was subjected to that. Until then, I had never even travelled in an aeroplane, the police showed me what exactly it was.'' Later, he was shifted to the central jail which proved to be the turning point in his life. It became a sort of university -- he started reading books and meeting several political prisoners, Socialists, Congress and Anjuman leaders. "Jail gave me a new angle and dimension,'' he says.

After being released, he joined the Government Law College in Bangalore and passed out with flying colours. He became a junior to noted advocate S V Raghavachar in 1983 and his senior colleague used to be Karnataka High Court judge Justice Nagmohan Das.

When elections to the Bangalore city corporation were announced, he had no inclination to contest, but the party and present home minister V S Acharya forced his mother -- a teacher -- to ask him to contest. Suresh owes a lot to his mother and calls her an "inspiration''. He won and was re-elected in 1990. Suresh entered the assembly for the first time in 1994 and was re-elected in 1999. After tasting defeat in 2004, he got elected again in 2008 to become a minister in the Yeddyurappa government.

Suresh's hobbies are, like him, simple: cycling and trekking. In 1975, he went on a cycle expedition to Kanyakumari. He's trekked to Amarnath twice and Ghomukh and beyond Gangotri once. But his favourite hobby is reading books. He's just completed N R Narayana Murthy's `A Better India, A Better World' and Nandan Nilekani's `Imagining India'. Reading has naturally led to writing and today he has a column in two Kannada dailies.

No profile of Suresh Kumar is complete without a mention of his love for movies. "I used to watch 75 to 80 films a year, most of them Hindi. I like movies directed by Gulzar and Naseeruddin Shah is my favourite actor. My favourite films are `Parichay', `The Great Escape' and `Operation Daybreak', `Naagarahaavu' and `Bhoothayana Maga Aiyoo','' he says. Most recently he's watched `Rang de Basanti' and `A Wednesday'.

Fave things

* Netas: George Fernandes, A B Vajpayee, Pranab Mukerjee, A K Antony, S Kailash, B Somashekar, B L Shankar, former Speaker Ramesh Kumar

* Non-netas: Anna Hazare and Baba Amte

* Daily routine: Morning walk at 4.30 am and then goes through 15 newspapers

* Food: Home-cooked items

* Clothes: Simple kurta pyjama and tailored shirt and trousers.