In his latest book, Abhishek Choudhary takes us through the first 30 years of former prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s life, and how he rose to the echelons of admiration. The period in focus is between 1924 and 1977. One of the aims, the author says, of the literary work was to “fix some basic facts” that offered a skewed narrative of the statesman’s life. The book weighs in on the importance of his formative years in shaping his ideology and subsequent entry into Indian politics.
Vajpayee was born on December 25, 1924, in Bateshwar, Uttar Pradesh, to a devout Brahmin family that had a long legacy of astrologers and priests. His moment of birth was claimed as a good omen by his grandfather, Shyamlal. The stars and planets were said to be perfectly aligned. His father, Krishn Behari, was the first to break out of the family profession to become the headmaster of a school in Gwalior. Influenced by Arya Samaj, he developed a sense of nationalism that gave importance to ‘Hindu Unity’, a line of thought that was imbibed by his son.
An avid reader, Vajpayee’s early consciousness of the Hindu ethos came from magazines such as Veer Arjun, Vikram and Kesari. He was also inspired by historical fiction on martyrdom against the Mughals. As a result, the author tells us, “Atal had come to have a sharp sense of his past––the Hindu past”. His high-school years changed his life in two ways––first, he became a master of rhetoric, frequently debating in Hindi. Secondly, he became familiar with the All India Students’ Federation. From this point, his journey to becoming “the Sangh’s most loyal son” is written about with explicit dexterity by Choudhary. By the age of 25, the then leader-in-making had already been editing Panchjanya, the weekly magazine of RSS, and taking up issues of language debates, the Hindu Code Bill, cow protection among others.
As the new Jana Sangh party president, he championed the cause of reclaiming Indian territory on the Kutch-Sindh border, which was given to Pakistan by the international tribunal to establish the international boundary. Many of the causes that he initially took up or even the elections he fought, however, gave him what the author calls “a poor debut” as the party president. On the other hand, his admiration in the eyes of common people was exponentially increasing. For them, he was a leader who maintained a balance in his political career and was a prodigious academic. He was seen as the radical Jana Sangh president who vouched for an end to social evils such as untouchability and dowry. While Vajpayee did not succeed in garnering considerable wins when Indira Gandhi was prime minister, he managed to secure a positive public image and was desperately looking for opportunities to topple the government. In 1971, he demanded a resolution in support and recognition of Bangladesh in the Lok Sabha and the Jana Sangh launched a satyagraha for the cause. In the tussle between the ruling government and the Jana Sangh, the politician perpetually emphasised the oppressive and dictatorial nature of the former, in the process,
claiming a legacy of being connected to the working class as opposed to the elite.
The author also gives us a glimpse into Vajpayee’s personal life while living in the heart of Delhi as an MP. Having been part of the RSS for a long time, Vajpayee was aware that the Sangh preferred its members remain celibate. But loneliness got the better of him, leading him to have an affair with Rajkumari Kaul, a married woman. While the two never tied the knot, they had a child, who was brought up in the Kaul household. This schism between the personal and political, Choudhary writes, pained the leader to a great extent and resulted in excessive drinking. Nevertheless, history is proof, he went on to achieve great heights in his career.The book locates Vajpayee in the “larger pantheon of Hindu nationalism” by giving a close reading of his post-Independence ascent. The three distinctive periods of his life are contextualised in the ever-changing tide of Indian politics in which Atal Bihari Vajpayee found a deep-seated footing.