Vajpayee’s legacy lives on as country marks his birth centenary

New Delhi PTI: Delivering one of his more famous speeches at the BJP’s inaugural convention at Shivaji Park in Mumbai, Atal Bihari Vajpayee predicted on December 30, 1980 with his signature flourish: ‘Andhera chhatega, suraj niklega, kamal khilega’ (darkness will end, the sun will rise, lotus will bloom). As his birth centenary arrives, his words have aged well, with the BJP returning to power for a third straight term at the centre and lotus in full bloom.

If Prime Minister Narendra Modi made the BJP’s cultural agenda the centre of national politics, Vajpayee helped the party occupy this centre when its cultural agenda was considered an anathema. A statesman politician and a peerless orator, India’s first non-Congress prime minister to have served a full term commanded respect and affection from across the political aisle and stood tall with his innate democratic spirit, honed through decades in opposition, in a politics crowded with powerful satraps.

The three-time prime minister was the original builder of coalition politics at the national level, successfully running an alliance government for a full term while navigating some of the biggest national crises, including the plane hijack in 1999 and the terror attack on Parliament in 2001, both with direct links to Pakistan. His government’s measured handling of the two incidents drew criticism from some quarters, including right wing organisations considered ideologically affiliated to the BJP but less than friendly to him for not pushing their cultural and economic agenda, but his standing ensured that he faced no political threat or popular backlash.

And even as he was still smarting from the fall of his government by one vote in the Lok Sabha in April 1999, his firm military and deft diplomatic response to Pakistan’s intrusion into Kargil as the head of a caretaker government earned him plaudits and powered the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance to a more stable majority, ensuring him a full term at the helm. Ashok Tandon, media adviser to Vajpayee during his six-year stint as PM, said besides being an outstanding parliamentarian who did his bit in “strengthening the roots of parliamentary democracy” after entering the Lok Sabha for the first time in 1957, he brought “good governance” at the centre of agenda as the head of government.

“Good governance was his landmark contribution. He headed a diverse coalition of parties and kept them together, while pursuing policies which helped the country in every field,” he told PTI, citing the launch of Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan, PM Gramin Sadak Yojna and the Golden Quadrilateral ighway projct under his stewardship.