For the vast majority of Indians, Vajpayee was that rare breed, that once-in-a-generation occurrence whose becalming influence as a public persona served as an antidote to a squalor-ridden legacy, that momentary glimmer of a shining gem in a cesspool of ugly one-upmanships
A rather grim-looking Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi was frantically battling the heat and humidity on Friday — wiping off those stubborn beads of sweat flowing down from his head and face in a never-ending stream. Barely 20 feet away, at Smriti Sthal (spot of remembrance), lay the mortal remains of his party’s behemoth — former prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee. Age finally caught up with one of India’s tallest sons whose half a century-old political career was as steeped in a dignified diligence to sobriety as was his penchant for poetry in personal life.
But coming back to Modi’s sweat-soaked homage to a stalwart on a sultry mid-August afternoon in Delhi. In the wake of the Gujarat riots in 2002, Vajpayee, the then prime minister, had reminded Modi, then the chief minister (CM) of Gujarat, about a public servant’s inalienable accountability and non-negotiable commitment to “Raj Dharm” (duty of the ruler). Telling words, coming from a veteran who had been a part of India’s freedom struggle, who was jailed during former prime minister Indira Gandhi’s draconian assault on democracy in the name of Emergency.
No one will perhaps ever know whether Modi’s mind had raced back to Vajpayee’s sagacious advice, as smoke billowed from the pyre at Smriti Sthal on Friday. But for the vast majority of Indians and for the country’s political class in particular, Vajpayee was that rare breed, that once-in-a-generation occurrence whose becalming influence as a public persona served as an antidote to a squalor-ridden legacy, that momentary glimmer of a shining gem in a cesspool of selfish interests and ugly one-upmanships. His political ambition never let him lose sight of his bigger role as a statesman — nation-building. He never let his ideology play second fiddle to opportunism. His glowing tributes to Indira on the floor of the parliament, in the wake of the then prime minister’s paramount role in Bangladesh’s war of liberation in 1971; his decision to announce a two-year moratorium on all nuclear tests immediately after India’s proud proclamation of nuclear weapons capability…
