On Arnab Goswami's riveting News Hour recently, I found myself uncharacteristically isolated. We were debating the desirability of awarding the Bharat Ratna to Atal Behari Vajpayee, and I emerged as the lone voice of opposition. The other panelists thought my opposition was 'personal' or perverse, or both.
Actually, my dissent was well-grounded. The owner of Outlook found on May 29, 2001 an income tax raiding party, which the Hindustan Times described as "one of the largest in recent times", knocking at his door. The raid came in response to a series of definitive exposes in the publication of the wrongdoing rampant in Vajpayee's PMO. Prima facie, the finger of suspicion pointed at the late Brajesh Mishra, the bureaucrat NK Singh and the all-powerful Vajpayee son-in-law, Ranjan Bhattacharya.
To say my proprietor (Rajan Raheja) went through hell would be an understatement. For the first time in my 40-year professional career I witnessed relentless and choreographed harassment. Raheja would be summoned to the damp, piss-stinking office of the Enforcement Directorate and made to wait from 10am to 6pm. He was then told to come the next day. And the next.
In a letter I wrote to the PM, I began,
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"Dear Atalji, the income tax raids on Outlook's proprietor and, worse, the Outlook editorial office are shocking. You yourself have been a victim of the Emergency, so you should know better. I appreciate you and your advisers do not always agree with our point of view, but to order tax raids! I write this letter to you not because I want you to do anything. An editor must live with such things. I write because I hold you personally in such high esteem..."
I did not even get an acknowledgement.
My personal peeve, therefore, is not without basis. Nevertheless, after the programme ended, I had a troubled night as I wrestled with my usually dormant 'inner voice'. Had I been excessively harsh on Vajpayee? Was the Bharat Ratna proposal entirely fatuous? As cross-party support for Atalji grows, my dilemma has deepened.
Vajpayee was perhaps the only BJP leader I got to know well. It was impossible not to like the old boy. Periodically, I would go to 7, Race Course Road and have a cup of tea in his genial company. We would gup-shup. I told him the latest joke doing the rounds; he passed on what came his way. Since he is the only prime minister I have known who had a sense of humour, he enjoyed the exchange of witticisms.
Once when I went to see him he did not seem his usual jovial self. I asked him why he was so glum. "Aapke baad Jayalalitha ayengi" (After you Jayalalitha is coming). And then he laughed uproariously.
More importantly, he possessed wisdom, a vision and natural dignity. (He also wrote some bad verse but we can forgive him the literary lapse!) Atalji's pet obsession was improving relations with Pakistan. History, he felt, was on his side. It took a Republican president (Richard Nixon) to make a breakthrough with China, he argued; it would take a BJP prime minister to make a breakthrough with Pakistan. He talked about this incessantly.
I am convinced if Vajpayee had not been prime minister, India would have sent troops to fight in George Bush's Iraq invasion. He dreaded phone calls from 'George' imploring him to send even a token force. To complicate matters, Advani on a visit to Washington had promised Bush military support in Iraq. "His soldiers are dying in Iraq, now he wants my soldiers to die. I will never let that happen," he told me.
Vajpayee summoned A B Bardhan and H K Surjeet. The two communist leaders had launched a nation-wide campaign against any Indian involvement in Iraq. He asked them how the protests were going. They said public response was encouraging. "But I can't hear anything", he complained. The canny old fox was suggesting they raise the decibel level of the protests so he could tell Bush his hands were tied. Note the subtlety of his strategy.
What has my inner voice told me? It has told me I should rethink my opposition to Vajpayee. And that is exactly what I have done.
So Atalji, for all it is worth and despite the ugly tax raids, I have joined those who believe you deserve the coveted award. When it comes to national icons, the BJP's cupboard is utterly bare. It is in the country's interest they should have at least one. The day the happy news is announced, I shall drink an extra glass of red wine to toast you. Knowing your past fondness for a snifter, I hope your health permits you to join me.
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This piece first appeared in the Times of India
