On the Occasion of  87th Birth Anniversary on December 25?

Atalji – A  great visionary nation builder?

By Girish Chandra Mishra?

December 25, this year is Atal Bihari Vajapeyee’s 87th birthday. It is strang coincidence that his birthday synchronises with famous Hindu leader Pt Madan Mohan Malviya. He has a rare combination of a poet, journalist and political leader of greatness par excellence. The Shakespeare epithet aptly applies to him ‘Ceazer’s wife should be above suspicion’. This has proved true during his whole parliamentary career of over four decades both as a parliamentarian and Prime Minister of India. He got Parliamentary Award for his excellence. His patriotic poems have been collected and published in almost all the languages of the country. His biographies have also been published along with his speeches and poems.

I was fortunate to work as his colleague during his editorship of Panchjanya Weekly and Swadesh Daily. He never behaved as a boss.

He passed his MA in 1947 from DAV College, Kanpur securing first division in Political Science. Then he offered himself to serve RSS as a pracharak. RSS  Sarsanghachalak of UP Bhau Rao Deoras asked him to start ‘Ras tradharm’ monthly from Lucknow. There Pt Deen Dayal Upadhaya was MD of the publication and his guide and mentor.

Later on, after five years Pt Deen Dayalji, Atalji, Nanaji Desmukh were asked by Guruji, RSS Sarsanghchalak to work in Jansangh, a newly formed political party by Dr Syama Prasad Mookherji. The future events are known to public. After Mukherji martyrdom in J&K jail, Deen Dayal ji became the President of Jan-Sangh. But unfortunately, Deen Dayalji was mysteriously murdered in 1968. Then Atalji took over presidentship of the party. In 1975, Indira Gandhi imposed emergency in the country and Atalji was also its victim like others who were sent to jail.

After the emergency was lifted and elections were held in 1977 in Janta Party’s name. Indira Gandhi was defeated and Janta Party won with thumping majority in Parliament. Morarji Desai was elected Prime Minister. He made Atalji Foreign Minister. During this tenure, he did his job with great success and developed good relations with various countries including Pakistan, USA, China etc.

Later on, when he became Prime Minister himself, he continued this process from 1996 to 2004 with a short gap when he lost the majority. His leadership of NDA with 24 parties will be written in golden letters and definitely it was a miracle.

Even when Pt JL Nehru was our first Prime Minister and Atalji was a very young parliamentarian, Nehru always gave a patient hearing to Atalji’s criticism of his foreign policies. Not only that, Nehruji had forecasted that one day, this young genius would become the Prime Minister of India and we know his words proved true.

Great political stalwarts like late PV Narasimha Rao and Chandra Shekhar who had been Prime Ministers called Atalji ‘Gurudeva’. This shows how much respect he commanded. The masses and the elite both have had great respect for him. His smile is charming. All of his qualities combined together made his charismatic personality. He is polite and very kind hearted. Atalji was the only Prime Minister of India who spoke in Hindi at the UNO session. This brought him much praise from all over the country. He is a far-sighted and astute political leader. The Pokhran- II explosion is also his great contribution which made us very proud as a nation in the whole would.

He has been ailing for the last few months and not appearing before the public. But his silence is no less important than his speeches.

I pray God to grant him long life on his birthday as his friend, colleague and admirer.

(The writer is a former editor, ‘Panchjanya’contacted at 6/769, Vivekanand Puri, Civil Lines, Sitapur-261 001)