Atal Bihari Vajpayee - Revision history

Jyoti: /* A profile */

2025-07-31T15:31:27Z

‎A profile

Pdewan: /* All the same: India asserted itself as a nuclear power */

2023-07-30T11:46:27Z

‎All the same: India asserted itself as a nuclear power

Pdewan: /* In 1979, Vajpayee opposed nuclear tests */

2023-07-30T11:32:12Z

‎In 1979, Vajpayee opposed nuclear tests

Pdewan: /* India asserted itself as a nuclear power */

2023-07-30T11:31:47Z

‎India asserted itself as a nuclear power

Jyoti: /* Nehru and ABV */

2023-06-22T18:55:11Z

‎Nehru and ABV

Jyoti: /* The eternal bachelor */

2023-06-07T14:47:33Z

‎The eternal bachelor

Jyoti: /* Foreign policy */

2023-06-05T05:39:21Z

‎Foreign policy

Jyoti: /* Senior leaders’ recollections */

2021-01-12T08:57:09Z

‎Senior leaders’ recollections

Jyoti: /* Senior leaders’ recollections */

2020-11-30T07:46:12Z

‎Senior leaders’ recollections

Jyoti: /* A profile */

2018-08-20T00:24:43Z

‎A profile

← Older revision		Revision as of 15:31, 31 July 2025
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	Ghatate has been busy compiling Vajpayee's jokes and witticisms into a book. He has so far collected about 80; he knows there are many more out there.		Ghatate has been busy compiling Vajpayee's jokes and witticisms into a book. He has so far collected about 80; he knows there are many more out there.
		+
		+	=Biographies=
		+	==Abhishek Choudhary, 2025==
		+	[https://epaper.indiatimes.com/article-share?article=27_07_2025_024_003_cap_TOI July 27, 2025: ''The Times of India'']
		+
		+
		+	''' It’s the centennial year of both Vajpayee and the R S S. Does the dilemma in the title allude to Vajpayee’s complicated relationship with the Sangh Parivar? '''
		+
		+	Yes. In phases of ascendancy, Vajpayee outgrew the R S S to become a national figure; in moments of crisis, he was pulled back into the fold by the Parivar’s organisational muscle. Tensions sharpened in 1979, when he publicly blamed the R S S for the Janata govt’s collapse. They floated the BJP in confusion, but the relationship remained convoluted. The title also gestures beyond Vajpayee — to broader dilemmas in the right-wing ecosystem: the tension between power and responsibility versus ideological purity. It also hints at the predicament of the average Hindu believer: how to inhabit one’s religious identity without surrendering to its chauvinistic articulations.
		+
		+	''' ■ You call Vajpayee a ‘classic doublethinker’… '''
		+
		+	Only in a specific context. Vajpayee saw himself as both a swayamsevak and a democrat and convinced himself the two were not only compatible but complementary: that a gentle kind of Hindutva was the only sustainable model of secularism. Flip the conviction slightly, and yes, one could call him a classic doublethinker. But that tendency isn’t unique to him. Jawaharlal Nehru, Vallabhbhai Patel, Ambedkar too had moral dilemmas, but not this kind of double-speaking. Yet, the same traits that made Vajpayee a doublethinker also kept him consequential, while more progressive voices of his generation faded from public memory.
		+
		+	''' ■ You write that in 1988, Vajpayee came close to quitting the BJP — a moment V P Singh also alluded to in his memoir. But Vajpayee later laughed this off. How did you confirm this, and what brought him to that point? '''
		+
		+	The late 1980s were a confusing, event-packed phase — and Vajpayee’s worst period. Marginalised after the 1984 rout, he let Advani and Nagpur steer the party rightward. After Shiv Sena won Vile Parle in 1987, the BJP sought collaboration. Simultaneously, Bofors broke out and V P Singh was floating a new party. Vajpayee flirted with joining him. The BJP’s founding president proposed a new party with select moderates. But he realised the cost: his political capital and emotional investment were tied to the Sangh ecosystem. If the alternative had been more robust, Vajpayee may have quit. I would not judge him. He would deny it later, but several people I spoke to confirmed that it did happen.
		+
		+	''' ■ You start the book by saying you wanted to set some facts straight. What were these myths? '''
		+
		+	Let me mention three here. First, he wasn’t as culpable in the 1983 Assam violence as some make out. Second, his obfuscations during the Ayodhya movement — especially his defence of the BJP in Parliament — helped spread the impression that the razing of Babri was a freak accident, despite much evidence to the contrary. Third, that the 1998 nuclear tests were a political stunt by the right-wing govt. In fact, by this time, with the CTBT deadline looming, nuclear testing had ceased to be a moral question for the political class. The Treaty was seen as the P5 (permanent members of the UN Security Council) freezing the nuclear apartheid status quo. Even the CPM thought the P5 were being hypocritical. Any stable govt might have tested. The protests from Communists and Congress later were mostly tactical.
		+
		+	''' ■ Why has Brand Vajpayee become bigger after his death? '''
		+
		+	Because the ideological project he served has grown far bigger. We forget how often he was overshadowed by Congress prime ministers. In 2004, he completed a full term, helping turn India into a multi-party democracy. At this moment of paranoid polarisation, it’s easy to forget that three decades ago, few believed that a party other than Congress could steer this mindbogglingly disparate country. There’s a PR aspect too: the current dispensation wants his name on welfare schemes etc, minus his civility and sagacity. Some of the posthumous glow also comes from liberal nostalgia — for a more conciliatory era. But that, too, is selective memory.
		+
		+	''' ■ You describe how Vajpayee voted against the Indo-US nuclear deal he helped lay the groundwork for. What made him do that? '''
		+
		+	It had everything to do with the BJP’s desperation by mid-2008. As poll defeats piled up, survival instincts trumped foreign policy. Vajpayee, stroke-battered, wanted to help Advani bag the top job. If the UPA lost a trust vote, a bypoll might follow. If the NDA grabbed power, Advani told allies he’d renegotiate the deal. And so, the patriarch was stretchered into Parliament to vote against the deal — a pathetic final visit for India’s longest-serving parliamentarian.
		+
		+	''' ■ You write with empathy, especially in the final chapters. How did you navigate the balance between biographical detachment and empathy? '''
		+
		+	Navigating the balance is not my chief concern. I gather the material, then let it lead me; both take depressingly long. Yes, I try to understand my subjects on their own terms — especially when I disagree with them. Vajpayee’s final years — stripped of voice and agency — were tragic, and I tried to capture that. In one of his last appearances, he wondered if a human being could ever truly liberate oneself. Asked to recite a poem, he said he’d turned into a kavi ka bhoot — a poet’s ghost, the title of the last chapter. For his peers, his end also intimated the nearing of their own. The last bits are, therefore, about the tolls of ambition and the burden of history.
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	= Political career=		= Political career=

@@ Line 728: / Line 728: @@
 ATAL BIHARI VAJPAYEE]]
-==All the same: India asserted itself as a nuclear power==
+==All the same, in 1999 India asserted itself as a nuclear power==
 [https://epaper.timesgroup.com/Olive/ODN/TimesOfIndia/shared/ShowArticle.aspx?doc=TOIDEL%2F2018%2F08%2F17&entity=Ar02013&sk=40AB75D3&mode=text  SHAKTI SINHA, Atal-led India asserted itself as responsible nuclear power, August 17, 2018: ''The Times of India'']
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 When the Pokhran mission was accomplished, it was with great satisfaction and pride that India wrote to world leaders explaining the need for the tests. Contrary to what the west projected — India and Pakistan as reckless nuclear powers — India asserted that it was the growing influence and aggression of China that had led to the tests. China, at that time, made aggressive inroads into Indian territory in the east.
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 “A day after the CCPA meeting, Subrahmanyam confronted Vajpayee. ‘How could you oppose it?’ he asked Vajpayee. ‘You have been for it all along.’ ‘No, no, now the most important thing is to stop Pakistan from making the bomb,’ Vajpayee replied defensively. ‘And we should not provoke them.’” it says.
- Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee congratulated the Indian Scientists and engineer at a Press conference in New Delhi soon after India successfully conducted three underground nuclear tests in Pokhran range.
+Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee congratulated the Indian Scientists and engineer at a Press conference in New Delhi soon after India successfully conducted three underground nuclear tests in Pokhran range.
 ==All the same: India asserted itself as a nuclear power==

@@ Line 705: / Line 705: @@
 ''The economy under PM Atal Bihari Vajpayee''
-== India asserted itself as a nuclear power==
+==In 1979, Vajpayee opposed nuclear tests==
 [https://epaper.timesgroup.com/Olive/ODN/TimesOfIndia/shared/ShowArticle.aspx?doc=TOIDEL%2F2018%2F08%2F17&entity=Ar02013&sk=40AB75D3&mode=text  SHAKTI SINHA, Atal-led India asserted itself as responsible nuclear power, August 17, 2018: ''The Times of India'']
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 When the Pokhran mission was accomplished, it was with great satisfaction and pride that India wrote to world leaders explaining the need for the tests. Contrary to what the west projected — India and Pakistan as reckless nuclear powers — India asserted that it was the growing influence and aggression of China that had led to the tests. China, at that time, made aggressive inroads into Indian territory in the east.
 ==Computer savvy in 1999==

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 On his part, Nehru, who was 68 years old when Vajpayee first got elected to the Parliament as a nominee of the Bharatiya Jana Sangh (BJS), the BJP’s erstwhile avatar, at the age of 32, was not dismissive of the young MP, who he thought was a “likeable, bright young man in an otherwise regressive party”.
 However, Nehru never prophesied a prime ministership for Vajpayee, Choudhary writes, seeking to debunk this claim made by many in the past. His book points out that Vajpayee managed to elicit a response from Nehru, albeit a stinging one, soon after he entered the Lok Sabha for the first time in 1957 by winning from the Balrampur seat (now scrapped) in Uttar Pradesh.
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 “It was not clear to Vajpayee what a nightclub was exactly. Rasgotra assured him that it was not a strip club: ‘Nagn nritya nahin hota hai. You would get to see what shape modern music is taking – there is jazz, instrumental, local music.’ Vajpayee got excited: ‘Chaliye, ye bhi ek nayi duniya hai.’ On such informal outings he drank a peg or two. But there were real limits to how informal Vajpayee could get with his companion. He did not confide in Rasgotra about the ongoing tumult in his private life,” states the book.
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← Older revision		Revision as of 14:47, 7 June 2023
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	Vijay says Vajpayee always had a lot of affection for the people of Kanpur. “He made it a point to attend weddings and other private functions of his old acquaintances,” he says.		Vijay says Vajpayee always had a lot of affection for the people of Kanpur. “He made it a point to attend weddings and other private functions of his old acquaintances,” he says.
		+
		+	==The leader==
		+	[https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/home/sunday-times/all-that-matters/vajpayee-was-more-critical-to-the-sanghs-ascent-than-advani-abhishek-choudhary/articleshow/100216178.cms?from=mdr Neelam Raaj, May 14, 2023: ''The Times of India'']
		+
		+	NEW DELHI: Besides offering some interesting insights into his early life, Abhishek Choudhary’s new biography titled ‘Vajpayee: The Ascent of the Hindu Right 1924-1977’ rebuts several myths about the man. In an interview to Sunday Times, Choudhary talks about why his aim was not to write a tribute but an unsentimental portrait, warts and all
		+
		+	''' There have been countless books on Vajpayee. What made you delve into his life? '''
		+
		+	At the time I delved into this project, in 2015, there was surprisingly no major study on him. As I spent a few months in the archives, I stumbled upon new facts and interpretations and realised that we knew shockingly little about his early life: how he had managed to evade arrest during the R S S ban of 1948-49, and how he steered the underground in Allahabad and Banaras; the deaths of his parents from cancer in quick succession in 1955. Meanwhile, with a BJP government in power, there was a renewed interest in understanding his career. But most books that came out were based on secondary sources, and were often either hagiographic or quickies that caricatured his apparent liberalism and meat-eating and drinking habits. I hoped that if I slogged long and hard enough in the archives, I might be able to say something of value.
		+
		+	''' You have unearthed some fascinating insights into his childhood— how contrary to myth, he wasn’t a good student; his early poems that spoke of Hindu victimhood etc. How did his early years in Gwalior influence him? '''
		+
		+	The decade he spent in Gwalior (1935-45) shaped his politics profoundly and, in many ways, lasted a lifetime. It was there that the adolescent Atal obsessively consumed the Arya Samaji version of history — of a glorious ancient India of Hindus being undone by Islamic and British conquests — through newspapers, plays, novels. It was there that he wrote ‘Hindu Tann Mann’, his most popular poem; it was there that he first attended the R S S shakha and discovered his gift for public speaking; and it was there that he won his first student union elections. By the time he left for Kanpur in 1945 for his master’s (and never quite returned home), his political character was more or less formed: essentially conservative yet curious and conciliatory, detached yet quietly ambitious.
		+
		+	''' Others have written about how Vajpayee admired Nehru but the picture you paint is of lots of differences, especially over issues like China, and then a grudging respect. Is that correct? '''
		+
		+	Yes! Their early exchanges in Parliament in 1957 were bitter, with Vajpayee constantly sniping at Nehru’s failures, and the Prime Minister writing him off as somewhere between a minor nuisance and a “highly objectionable person”. The animus began to melt gradually. Vajpayee noticed that despite the occasional fits of temper, Nehru was tolerant and unjudgemental towards the opposition. Nehru did not mind receiving occasional praise and constructive advice from an adversary; he also began to think of Vajpayee as a bright young man in an otherwise regressive party.
		+
		+	Contrary to myths, though, Nehru never prophesied a prime ministership for Vajpayee, for it would have meant having the country run by the Sangh Parivar—perhaps one of his worst nightmares. They bickered inside and outside Parliament—on the border dispute with China especially— till Nehru’s last days, but personally they continued to be affectionate.
		+
		+	''' As a biographer, you’ve surely had an intense and, at times, all-consuming focus on his life for the last few years. What did you make of him? He was a man of many contradictions, wasn’t he? '''
		+	Indeed, he was! But moral dilemma is rather common, banal even, and biographers train themselves to tackle it. My bigger challenge was often separating his genuine dilemmas from his cynical doublespeak on dozens of occasions—his December 5, 1992 speech in Lucknow on the eve of Babri demolition, or his April 4, 2002 Rajdharma pep-talk in Ahmedabad. I leave the judging to readers.
		+
		+	''' You’ve noted how his stock has been rising in recent years but are you also arguing he hasn’t got enough credit for the rise of Jan Sangh/BJP? '''
		+
		+	No, I didn’t mean that. I was simply trying to counter the public myths on Vajpayee (liberal vs mask binaries), and pleading for more rigorous assessments of the Hindu Right. I argue that to interpret their ascent simply as a byproduct of the Ayodhya movement is lazy and self-deceptive. It bypasses an earlier trend: the Jan Sangh galloped from four Lok Sabha seats in 1957 to 35 in 1967 and 90 in 1977. And the BJP-R S S’s recent obsessions — Ayodhya, Uniform Civil Code, Article 370, a central ban on cow-slaughter — all date back to the early decades. Vajpayee had been the party’s face since 1957, and one of its key strategists. In that sense, he was more critical to the Sangh’s project of Hinduising India than someone like Advani.
		+
		+	''' Another myth that you bust is that his relationship with Rajkumari Kaul was purely intellectual. How did she influence him? '''
		+
		+	Despite being a rising political star, Vajpayee was emotionally a lonely, desolate man-child. The deaths of his parents in 1955 had stunned him. The trauma demanded closure, but there had been no time and no outlet. Rajkumari became the emotional anchor of his life but attributing his political moderation or intellectual evolution to her is a serious exaggeration, though Prof B N Kaul, her husband, sometimes added finesse to Vajpayee’s speeches.
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	==The foodie==		==The foodie==

← Older revision		Revision as of 05:39, 5 June 2023
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	In the end, Vajpayee insisted on a direct commitment from Pakistan on containing terrorism in his last interaction with Musharraf in January, 2004. His successor Manmohan Singh felt economic interests could foster ties, with limited results.PM Narendra Modi has reverted to a focus on terrorism after initial failed overtures in a furtherance of what Vajpayee finally came around to believe.		In the end, Vajpayee insisted on a direct commitment from Pakistan on containing terrorism in his last interaction with Musharraf in January, 2004. His successor Manmohan Singh felt economic interests could foster ties, with limited results.PM Narendra Modi has reverted to a focus on terrorism after initial failed overtures in a furtherance of what Vajpayee finally came around to believe.
		+
		+	=Nehru and ABV=
		+	==A==
		+	[https://indianexpress.com/article/political-pulse/new-book-on-atal-bihari-vajpayee-nehruvian-8604343/ Sourav Roy Barman, May 12, 2023: ''The Indian Express'']
		+
		+	'' The Ascent of the Hindu Right 1924-1977' talks of BJP leader's support for Nehru during 1962 war and his admiration as a young man for the latter, but debunks that Nehru ever saw him as future PM ''
		+
		+	Atal Bihari Vajpayee, the country’s first prime minister from the R S S and Jana Sangh background, was dubbed a “Nehruite” during the Sino-Indian conflict in 1962, according to a new biography of the BJP’s iconic face.
		+
		+	In his book, “Vajpayee – The Ascent of the Hindu Right 1924-1977”, author Abhishek Choudhary writes that Acharya J B Kripalini, unhappy with Vajpayee’s refusal to call for Nehru’s resignation as the PM in the wake of the China-India war, made this jibe at a rally.
		+
		+	“Irked, Kripalini declared Vajpayee to be a Nehruvian in Jan Sanghi garb. At a rally held by the non-communist opposition on November 7, 1962, Kripalini warned the Swatantra Party leader Minoo Masani: ‘Don’t trust that man, he is essentially a Nehruite, and not one of us’,” says the book, published by Pan Macmillan India, which charts Vajpayee’s early years in parliamentary politics.
		+
		+	However, the author adds that Kripalini’s remark was born out of “prejudice” as Vajpayee’s differences with other Opposition leaders on this question were more “semantic rather than qualitative”. “Vajpayee simply felt that to ask Nehru to resign – in the middle of a war, and only six months after he had been returned to office with a two-thirds majority – was a fatuous, impractical proposition,” notes the author.
		+
		+	The book is however also replete with accounts showing a young Vajpayee’s quiet admiration for Nehru, especially in its chapter titled “Beloved Nemesis: The Nehru Years”.
		+
		+	On his part, Nehru, who was 68 years old when Vajpayee first got elected to the Parliament as a nominee of the Bharatiya Jana Sangh (BJS), the BJP’s erstwhile avatar, at the age of 32, was not dismissive of the young MP, who he thought was a “likeable, bright young man in an otherwise regressive party”.
		+	However, Nehru never prophesied a prime ministership for Vajpayee, Choudhary writes, seeking to debunk this claim made by many in the past. His book points out that Vajpayee managed to elicit a response from Nehru, albeit a stinging one, soon after he entered the Lok Sabha for the first time in 1957 by winning from the Balrampur seat (now scrapped) in Uttar Pradesh.
		+
		+	In his first Lok Sabha speech on May 15 that year, Vajpayee criticised Nehru on many counts, including on the latter’s Kashmir policy. “Would we liberate one-third of Kashmir by sending the army? No no. Would we gift it away to Pakistan? No no…Would we take police action in Goa? No no. Would we then permit a satyagraha there by our people? No no. Would we leave Goa to Portugal’s mercies? No no,” the book quotes Vajpayee as having said in his speech as Nehru listened silently.
		+
		+	The next day, in his response, Nehru referred to Vajpayee as a “’new netaji from our opposition party’ who was good only at churning out platitudes”. “Unke hathiyar mujhe zara baazaru maalum hue…Election still bears heavy on his mind, it seemed he thinks of the Lok Sabha too as an election meeting,” Nehru quipped.
		+
		+	The book says that PM Nehru got Vajpayee included in a list of the Indian delegates for the United Nations General Assembly session in 1960. At that time, Vajpayee was headed to the United States, in his first foreign trip, on the invitation of the US government to be present as an observer during the then presidential polls in which Democrat John F Kennedy and Republican Richard Nixon were locked in a contest.
		+
		+	During his stay in New York, Vajpayee was mostly in the company of a foreign service officer posted in the permanent mission of India to the UN, M K Rasgotra, who would later go on to serve as India’s foreign secretary. Rasgotra, who was instructed by Nehru’s office to introduce the first-time visitor to leaders from all continents so that he “gets a sense of how the real world works”, told the author that he felt Vajpayee had “very high regard for Panditji” and there was “quietly a relationship, sort of, building up between the two”.
		+
		+	Both in their early thirties then, Rasgotra and Vajpayee also shared some light camaraderie during the trip, as the young diplomat took the first-time MP to museums and art galleries, which “did not evoke any great interest” in Vajpayee, as well as nightclubs.
		+
		+	“It was not clear to Vajpayee what a nightclub was exactly. Rasgotra assured him that it was not a strip club: ‘Nagn nritya nahin hota hai. You would get to see what shape modern music is taking – there is jazz, instrumental, local music.’ Vajpayee got excited: ‘Chaliye, ye bhi ek nayi duniya hai.’ On such informal outings he drank a peg or two. But there were real limits to how informal Vajpayee could get with his companion. He did not confide in Rasgotra about the ongoing tumult in his private life,” states the book.
		+
		+	[[Category:India\|V ATAL BIHARI VAJPAYEE
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	=Senior leaders’ recollections=		=Senior leaders’ recollections=

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	Political observers have used various terms to describe Vajpayee: ‘statesman’ is perhaps the most commonly used to describe him. But for members of the Bhartiya Janata Party, he was more — a father figure whose ideals we seek to follow. Each of us, in our own way, is attempting to build on his vision of India — a nation with a deep civilizational past, and a young, modern republic, rooted in constitutional democracy. Vajpayee for us will remain the guiding light in these efforts and we in turn will seek to make him proud of our achievements.		Political observers have used various terms to describe Vajpayee: ‘statesman’ is perhaps the most commonly used to describe him. But for members of the Bhartiya Janata Party, he was more — a father figure whose ideals we seek to follow. Each of us, in our own way, is attempting to build on his vision of India — a nation with a deep civilizational past, and a young, modern republic, rooted in constitutional democracy. Vajpayee for us will remain the guiding light in these efforts and we in turn will seek to make him proud of our achievements.

		+	=The statesman=
		+	==National security above political gain==
		+	[https://epaper.timesgroup.com/Olive/ODN/TimesOfIndia/shared/ShowArticle.aspx?doc=TOIDEL%2F2021%2F01%2F11&entity=Ar01802&sk=7D06EB5F&mode=text January 11, 2021: ''The Times of India'']
		+
		+
		+
		+	Atal didn’t make issue of Rao govt’s Sukhoi advance: Book
		+
		+	‘Vajpayee Thought Govt Move Was In India’s Interests’
		+
		+	New Delhi:
		+
		+	The late Atal Bihari Vajpayee decided against raising a decision taken by the caretaker Narasimha Rao government to give an unusual $350 million advance to the Russian manufacturers of Sukhoi fighters as he considered the acquisition to be in India’s security interests, says a latest book on the former PM.
		+
		+	“Vajpayee — The Years That Changed India”, written by former IAS officer Shakti Sinha who worked with the late leader in opposition and also in office, recounts that the advance for the military aircraft had initially seemed like a scam. But Vajpayee wanted to know more and it transpired that the advance was needed to keep the Sukhoi manufacturing unit afloat. Then Russian President Boris Yeltsin sought the advance as the country’s economy was facing a rough patch.
		+
		+	Vajpayee decided not to raise the issue in the 1996 LS campaign, writes Sinha, as he felt that India’s security needs would be compromised. As things turned out Rao, who had taken a controversial but correct decision, lost poll and the deal was completed by SP member Mulayam Singh Yadav who became defence minister in the United Front government.
		+
		+	“Though too many details were not known at the time, Vajpayee didn’t use this point about an unusual advance in his poll campaign,” the book says, offering a contrast over political battles waged over recent defence deals.
		+
		+	Sinha writes that Vajpayee complimented Yadav in Parliament and his words of praise took some BJP members by surprise. Later, Yadav arranged a briefing for Vajpayee and senior BJP member Jaswant Singh explaining the circumstances of the military contract. Vajpayee wanted to signal domestic consensus on major security issues, particularly as regards Russia which was a major supporter of India in international forums and supplied most of its military imports. Written by an insider, the book sets out details on political developments that led to Vajpayee becoming PM in 1998 and the sensitive negotiations with AIADMK’s J Jayalalitha whose visit was preceded by a discussion on serving coconut water rather than tea. Sinha also sets out details of how she rocked and brought down the government over BJP’s inability to dismiss the DMK regime.
		+
		+	As per the book, contrary to popular perception, Vajpayee was not all that much of an extempore speaker and worked hard on his major speeches. He also rebuts the “right man in the wrong party” label for Vajpayee, noting that Vajpayee might have differed with BJP on occasions but remained loyal to the Sangh cause. He was steeped in Hindu cultural traditions in his upbringing.
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	=Rajkumari Kaul =		=Rajkumari Kaul =

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	Political observers have used various terms to describe Vajpayee: ‘statesman’ is perhaps the most commonly used to describe him. But for members of the Bhartiya Janata Party, he was more — a father figure whose ideals we seek to follow. Each of us, in our own way, is attempting to build on his vision of India — a nation with a deep civilizational past, and a young, modern republic, rooted in constitutional democracy. Vajpayee for us will remain the guiding light in these efforts and we in turn will seek to make him proud of our achievements.		Political observers have used various terms to describe Vajpayee: ‘statesman’ is perhaps the most commonly used to describe him. But for members of the Bhartiya Janata Party, he was more — a father figure whose ideals we seek to follow. Each of us, in our own way, is attempting to build on his vision of India — a nation with a deep civilizational past, and a young, modern republic, rooted in constitutional democracy. Vajpayee for us will remain the guiding light in these efforts and we in turn will seek to make him proud of our achievements.
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		+	=Rajkumari Kaul =
		+	== Vinay Sitapati on ABV and Mrs Kaul==
		+	[https://epaper.timesgroup.com/Olive/ODN/TimesOfIndia/shared/ShowArticle.aspx?doc=TOIDEL%2F2020%2F11%2F22&entity=Ar01905&sk=D93EC906&mode=text November 22, 2020: ''The Times of India'']
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		+	When the Vajpayee ‘parivar’ made the Parivar uneasy
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		+	In a new book, political scientist and author Vinay Sitapati traces not only Atal’s jugalbandi with Advani but also the ‘high command’ at home who shaped his life
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		+	Soon after he became a Lok Sabha MP, Vajpayee was invited to Ramjas College to give a talk. Present in the audience was a middle-aged philosophy professor, Brij Nath Kaul, along with his younger wife, Rajkumari. Rajkumari and Vajpayee had been classmates in Gwalior in 1941, but the attraction had fizzled and they had lost touch for the next sixteen years. The Ramjas talk rekindled the flame. From then on—and through the 1960s—the Kauls and Vajpayee were constantly in each other’s homes. When B.N. Kaul became warden of Ramjas hostel, students would know that Vajpayee was visiting by an official black Ambassador car parked outside. Kaul’s children soon became Vajpayee’s. He developed a special affection for the younger daughter, Namita, who was called Gunnu… The heart of the relationship between Vajpayee and Rajkumari was intellectual. From a provincial north Indian milieu, Vajpayee was both perplexed by as well as attracted to an educated woman who could hold her own. Friends remember Rajkumari arguing with Vajpayee on politics, her persistent yet soft sentences a contrast with Vajpayee’s commanding words. Rajkumari was fluent in English, well read and, unlike Vajpayee, came from an urbane family. As a Kashmiri Pandit in the Delhi of the 1960s, she had got to know the ‘Kashmiri Mafia’, i.e., the Pandit bureaucrats and officials who surrounded first Nehru, then his daughter — Rajkumari Kaul was after all a blood relation of Indira Gandhi. All this added up to a confident liberal.
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		+	This presented the R S S with a hurdle. As a family friend of the Kauls says: ‘The R S S had a huge problem with aunty Kaul. Vajpayee was a show-boy and they were proud of him. But they were very scared of aunty Kaul. Aunty Kaul had a huge influence on Vajpayee. She was a very, very powerful woman. She also made Vajpayee far more mellow, secular, cosmopolitan than he initially was. He was quite a provincial politician before he met her.’ If Mr Kaul had an objection to the relationship, he never articulated it. While Mr Kaul raised no objections, the party did…
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		+	Sometime around 1965, (R S S chief) Golwalkar travelled by train from Nagpur to Delhi, headed straight to the R S S office in Jhandewalan, and called a meeting with one item on the agenda: What was to be done about Mrs Kaul? Bhausaheb Deoras, the UP pranth pracharak, voiced his opinion: ‘As long as there is no publicity, it’s ok.’ Jana Sangh treasurer Nanaji Deshmukh disagreed, saying, ‘He [Vajpayee] should marry Rajkumari Kaul.’ Golwalkar listened to these opinions before pronouncing his own. He told Vajpayee to break off the relationship with Mrs Kaul. ‘Vajpayee, to his credit, refused to do so,’ Dattopant Thengadi, who was present, later told an aide.
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		+	Faced with a choice, Golwalkar decided not to punish Vajpayee… But it was also decided that Vajpayee would be removed from the inner circle of the R S S. Until now, Vajpayee had always done what the R S S had asked of him. But from now on, they would be at arm’s length, each needing the other, each never trusting the other.
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		+	Though she took care to never appear in the press herself, Rajkumari Kaul would ensure that the Hindi-speaking Vajpayee reached out to the Englishspeaking media. Karan Thapar remembers calling up Vajpayee’s house number to schedule an interview. ‘Mrs Kaul picked up and very sweetly asked us to come. When we came on schedule, Vajpayee was waiting. “You have spoken to the high command,” he told us.’ Advani had known Rajkumari Kaul for the last thirty years, and both had accepted the primacy of the other in their man’s life. What Advani found harder to accept was that Rajkumari Kaul’s son-inlaw Ranjan Bhattacharya and daughter Namita began to wield power.
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		+	In May 2001, the prime minister drove to the home minister’s home for a fourhour lunch. Advani poured out his hurt. He was being ignored by his oldest friend. Advani complained: ‘Not just other members of your family, but even Mrs Kaul is calling me a saanpnaath [snake lord].’ Vajpayee listened to Advani, then poured out his own hurt: Why were those close to Advani leaking stories in the press against his daughter and son-in-law? And why had the attacks on him by the R S S been so ‘vituperative’? Advani replied that it was thanks to his personal intervention that the criticisms had been ‘general rather than pointed’. Vajpayee got the message. He could not sideline both the R S S and Advani and expect to survive.
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		+	Edited excerpts from ‘Jugalbandi: The BJP before Modi’ by Vinay Sitapati with permission from Penguin Viking
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		+	[[Category:India\|V
		+	ATAL BIHARI VAJPAYEE]]
		+	[[Category:Politics\|V
		+	ATAL BIHARI VAJPAYEE]]

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 Vajpayee's NDA with an alphabet soup of some two dozen parties is arguably India's best-run coalition government yet. It sought to unshackle the economy while trying to keep the saffron warriors at bay-a worthy role model for its successor. And that is perhaps where the irony also comes into play-a Modi trying to focus on governance and development while the Sangh snaps at his heels with its divisive agenda. The wheel comes a full circle. Not only is the Bharat Ratna a token of the subconscious gratitude, it is also a mark of recognition for the BJP's ideal role model.
 == Thus spake Atal Bihari Vajpayee==
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 People tend to assume that Advaniji is very hard… It is a 50-year-old relationship. Yes, sometimes there are differences in thoughts. Sometimes he has his way, sometimes I do.
 ==The poet and the politician==