Author: K.P. Nayar
Publication: The Telegraph
Date: August 18, 2015
URL: http://www.telegraphindia.com/1150818/jsp/nation/story_37771.jsp#.VdMuI9Sqqkr

Abu Dhabi's decision to allot land for a Hindu temple has a history linked to the BJP's foray into the Gulf, which began when Atal Bihari Vajpayee, then the most prominent Opposition leader, set out for Oman, Bahrain and Kuwait in 1997.

Vajpayee's first stop was Oman, where he conveyed to Sultan Qaboos bin Said, the ruler, a request from the growing Indian community for a second temple.

The existing Shiva temple was estimated to be more that 350 years old, built by pioneering Gujarati merchants who had gone to Oman when it was a trans-continental power whose sovereign territories included Gwadar, now in Pakistan, and Zanzibar, now a part of Tanzania.

Today's oil-era Indian community in Muscat, the capital, wished to build a Krishna temple. For secular reasons, no Indian minister visiting the Sultanate was willing to convey the community's request to the Sultan.

The ruling al Said family agreed on the spot to Vajpayee's request to allot land and permit a new Hindu shrine. A member of the al Said family, who is at the very top but must remain anonymous because of the sensitivity of the subject, told this writer during Vajpayee's visit that it was refreshing to meet an Indian leader who was not apologetic about being a Hindu.

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Vajpayee's decision to visit the Gulf was the subject of much internal debate in the BJP before he undertook the trip.

Till then, no top leader from the party had gone on a dedicated mission to the region, which had been ignored by its leadership since it was restrictively Islamic and seen as unlikely to bring any political dividends even if it were fraternised.

Vajpayee argued for a change in this approach, pointing out that in most Gulf countries, the large and growing Indian population was majority Hindu. Fraternising with these expatriates, most of whom lived away from their families, would impact on their families back in India who vote in elections and engage in public activities.

Given the restrictions on political activity in Gulf countries, it was not possible for any BJP delegation to land up there and interact with the Indians. Besides, if permission for any such delegation were denied, the party would have egg on its face.

So it was decided that Vajpayee would make the trip as chairman of Parliament's standing committee on external affairs and lead a delegation of MPs.

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There is an eerie similarity between Narendra Modi's first prime ministerial visit to the Gulf and Vajpayee's first visit to the region.

If Modi arrived in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) on the heels of a logjam in the country's legislative process, with MPs in the well of both chambers of Parliament to block business, Vajpayee reached Kuwait on the day violence erupted in the Uttar Pradesh Assembly, where BJP chief minister Kalyan Singh's majority was challenged.

At the precise time the Assembly convened in Lucknow, Vajpayee had an appointment with the Speaker of Kuwait's national assembly. Kuwait was the only Arab Gulf state then with any semblance of democracy and a nascent but elected legislature.

Naturally, the Speaker of Kuwait's assembly was curious about democracy. Since Indian television is accessible in the Gulf, Vajpayee asked the Speaker if he would switch on his TV set and tune into news from India.

The screen lit up and showed MLAs in Lucknow trading blows, ripping out microphones and engaging in violence. At least a dozen legislators were injured. The Speaker asked Indian MPs in his chamber if this was how democracy always worked in India. Vajpayee, who is seldom at a loss for repartee, was silent for once.

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At least till the time of writing, there is less emphasis during his Gulf visit on Modi's pet project of "Make in India", possibly because the UAE is not a manufacturing hub or a centre of technology like Germany, Sweden or Japan.

It is just as well because Gulf Arabs often enlighten Indians with their age-old experience of "Make in India".

Boats were their only means of travel overseas once upon a time and camels were used for transport at home. Ever since the tribal settlements in the Gulf, including what is now the UAE, began to foray into the ocean, they depended on Kerala to make them the best boats.

Teak from Malabar has been the preferred material for dhows - merchant boats - for Gulf traders for centuries. With oil money, dhow owners have graduated to building pleasure boats in traditional Arab styles, but their source of teak and boat construction has unwaveringly remained the precincts of Calicut: the same Calicut made famous by Vasco da Gama with his landing there in 1498.

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There was a time when one could spend countless hours in the majlis - roughly translated as assembly or meeting place - of prominent Dubaiians listening to tales of their bygone links with India in the decades that preceding the discovery of oil.

Alas, the most interesting of these merchants are now dead. They would narrate incidents of having been fired at by the Indian Coast Guard because their boats were suspected of smuggling gold.

Saif al Ghurair, who was Dubai's biggest employer in the 1980s, was fond of narrating his experiences of sleeping in Calicut homes for days, sometimes weeks, waiting for favourable weather to sail back to Dubai with spices and textiles in exchange for dates or pearls.

One Indian merchant, a pioneer who made Dubai his home when it was nothing more than a hamlet, preserves a promissory note which Sheikh Rashid bin Saeed al Maktoum, father of the present Prime Minister of the UAE, wrote out for him when he needed cash.