Author: Vir Sanghvi
Publication: The Hindustan Times
Date: October 27, 2002
URL: http://www.hindustantimes.com/news/181_92035,00300001.htm
Few Prime Ministers have been as
hard to read as Atal Bihari Vajpayee. I never saw him in action during
his heyday as a fiery Jan Sanghi orator opposing the Congress and fighting
for the cause of the Hindi language. But over the last decade or so, the
press has consistently got him wrong.
In the 1990s, journalists wrote
him off only to hastily revise that opinion when he came back as the BJP's
prime ministerial candidate. During his first proper term as Prime Minister
(1997-99), the media used the BJP's election defeats (Delhi, Rajasthan
and Madhya Pradesh) to conclude that his government was finished only to
be confounded again by the Kargil victory and the electoral triumph of
1999.
Part of the problem, I suspect,
is Vajpayee's own personal style. When you meet him, he comes across
as a curious mixture of openness and brahminical cunning. He will rarely
say much, will encourage you to say more than you intended to and then,
when he does reveal his mind, will come up with something you least expected.
So it is with his speeches. I'm
not sure that even Vajpayee himself knows why some speeches work so brilliantly
and why some don't work at all. At times, he will be the proper and formal
Prime Minister, content to read out whatever his babus have given him.
But sometimes, his whole personality will suddenly be transformed on the
podium, his mouth will curl upwards into a slightly mocking smile, his
right hand will make those familiar gestures and like Sachin Tendulkar
on a good day, he will settle down for a long innings, hitting every ball
to the boundary.
I was reminded of the complexity
of the enigma that is Vajpayee when I saw TV clips of his speech at the
NDA rally on Friday. For a man who had turned his back on UP legislators
only three days before pleading a sore throat, it was a remarkable performance.
Once again, Vajpayee found his form, hit his sixes and scored a century.
There was one section in particular
that drove home to me how much the pundits have misread Vajpayee's mood.
That was the bit when he talked about the friendship with L.K. Advani;
how they had been together in the past, how there were no differences between
them now, how they would always be together etc etc. Apparently, Advani's
eyes filled with tears as he heard this rhapsody to their friendship.
Two things about this emotional
passage are worth noting. One: though there have always been denials of
any differences between the two men, these denials have traditionally emanated
from Advani, not Vajpayee. The significance of Friday's speech was that
Vajpayee - not Advani - was singing the friendship song.
And two: Why was everybody applauding
Vajpayee for saying that he loved Advani, anyway? According to what the
pundits told us only a few months ago, Vajpayee didn't matter any longer.
Advani was supposed to have taken over. Vajpayee was supposed to have abdicated
- for all practical purposes. And political power was said to have passed
from Race Course Road to Prithviraj Road.
And yet despite the political obituaries
of Vajpayee that featured in nearly every paper in the week that Advani
became Deputy Prime Minister, here was proof that nothing had really changed
after all. Vajpayee was still the focal point of the NDA. And Advani still
needed him to endorse their friendship.
Remember the tone of the commentaries
when Advani was elevated? 'End of the Vajpayee Raj' was a typical headline.
It was all over, the pundits said, the Prime Minister was old and tired.
He had effectively retired, L.K. Advani had taken over. The elevation was
only the first in a series of changes. More was to follow. And then, Vajpayee
would formally step down by the winter.
The National Security Council, we
were told, would shift to Advani's charge. So would the Ministry of Personnel.
Advani would appoint all secretaries to the Government of India - the PMO
would be kept out of the picture. Brajesh Mishra would be sacked - or,
at the very least, he would have to give up one of his two responsibilities.
There would be a Deputy Prime Minister's Office that would rival the PMO
in scope and power. Advani would get his own Principal Secretary and he
would really run the government. And so on.
To be fair to Advani, none of these
stories came from him. Some did, however, emanate from the chamchas and
camp-followers he claims not to have. But most were manufactured by the
media themselves. Journalists were convinced that Vajpayee was about to
retire. The pundits were sure that Advani's star was on the ascendant.
And so many of the predictions consisted of assumptions that would have
been logical had they not been based on faulty premises.
In fact, as we can see, the actual
business of government has not changed very much after Advani's elevation.
There is no all-powerful DPMO. Vajpayee still runs the Ministry of Personnel.
Neither the National Security Council nor the National Security Adviser
have been affected by the appointment. The PMO still liaises with ministers
and ministries. The Cabinet Secretary still appoints secretaries in consultation
with the Prime Minister. There is no all-powerful Principal Secretary to
the DPM.
Just as the mechanics of governance
have not really altered, Advani's elevation has also failed to lead to
any change in policy. When he was sworn in as Deputy Prime Minister, the
pundits said that the BJP was junking Vajpayee's 'middle of the road' approach.
It was taking a more pro-Hindutva line. Advani would be the hardline face
of the new BJP.
In fact, the policies have remained
exactly the same. Only Advani has continued to change. A few months ago,
I wrote about his shift to the moderate center. That process continues.
It is difficult to think of a single substantive issue where Advani sticks
to a hardline position, or even one where his views are at variance with
Vajpayee's.
So why did Vajpayee make Advani
Deputy Prime Minister? And how has the appointment changed things within
the NDA?
I don't think anyone really knows.
When Advani was sworn in, I offered one interpretation. The elevation,
I said, was proof that Vajpayee did not want to lead the party into the
next election. He wanted Advani to take on that responsibility and so,
he was effectively anointing him as heir apparent (within the NDA; he already
occupied that slot in the BJP).
Three months later, I'm sticking
to that interpretation. But I think that other motives have also become
clearer. It is obvious now that Vajpayee loathes the political part of
the job. He enjoys being Prime Minister, and he likes running the government.
But he hates having to tame the sangh parivar; he's fed up of having to
make excuses to voters because of the failures of the BJP state governments;
and he has no desire to listen to squabbling MLAs (like the ones he avoided
in Lucknow).
By appointing Advani Deputy Prime
Minister, Vajpayee has effectively given up sangh parivar politics. He's
sticking to the things he enjoys; deciding on troop deployment, evolving
Kashmir policy, fighting for economic reforms, meeting Tony Blair etc.
He has no desire to dirty his hands by gagging the likes of Praveen Togadia
and no wish to accept the blame as the BJP goes from defeat to defeat (Jammu
is only the latest example) in assembly elections.
So far, at least, he seems to have
got his own way. Insiders say that everybody is happy with the new arrangement.
The two men are closer than they have been at any time since the NDA took
office. Vajpayee's soliloquy about their friendship at Friday's rally was
not mere rhetoric: he actually meant all that stuff about being together,
forever.
And when it comes to policies, Advani
and Vajpayee are saying exactly the same things. When they met the RSS
leadership on Thursday, they were completely united. Nobody would have
believed that only a few months before, Advani was seen as the RSS man
and Vajpayee as the outsider. On Kashmir, Advani and Vajpayee jointly agreed
not to meet Hurriyat leaders after elections had been called and despite
all of Ram Jethmalani's pleading, Advani did not see Shabir Shah. On the
decision on withdrawal of troops from the border too, there was a complete
unity of approach.
It is hard to be sure of anything
when you are dealing with somebody as complex as Vajpayee. But it is clear
now that June's political obituaries were premature. He had never intended
to retire. He just wanted to unload those parts of the job that bored him
while still retaining the powers of the prime ministership.
It is a measure of his shrewdness
that he has managed to get his own way - and still make Advani happier
than he has been since this government was sworn in.
