A Profile in Greatness
It was unusual
for me on Monday, the July 27th that I reached home late and the hour’s
hand of the clock was touching 11 PM. I sat
down just to have supper while doing so put on the television to glance at the
day’s news. The CNN IBN was airing the
program with school children sitting on the lawns of ‘Rastrapati Bhavan’ and they
were in conversation with the former president of India Dr Kalam and he was jovial in the company of those school children.
Though it
was bit surprising for me to see that program such late night on the former
president, I just surmised that since the ‘Independence Day’ was nearing, the
program must have been a precursor of a sort for the occasion. But after a
while a message ran paying homage to Dr. Kalam, only then I realized the
enormity of the situation and understood the context of the TV channel airing
the program on Dr. Kalam. I was
perturbed for a while and memories of the great man came rushing.
I have no qualification
in whatsoever manner, either I have intellectual equipment or a moral compass
to write on a person of Dr Kalam's stature, but I can always take courage in the thought that
as an ordinary citizen of India can express my feelings. I first heard the name
of Dr. Kalam from one of my friends who was working with me at a cement company
in one of the remote villages of Andhra Pradesh.
My friend had an internship at DRDO in Hyderbad, where his project director was
Dr. Kalam. Often In our conversation, my friend used to mention about his good fortune of working under such a great scientist.
As I was minimalist in terms of
knowledge when it comes to science related topics, I used to be a passive
listener to my friends oft repeated Kalam centric discussions.
Yeas rolled
on since then, my life took many twists and turns and at the beginning of the new
millennium, while in Bengaluru, I started hearing Dr.Kalam’s name now and then in
newspapers especially when he was the scientific advisor to the Prime Minister
of India. I still remember, in one of the functions, addressing students of a
prestigious institution, a retired bureaucrat forebode, saying, good days are
coming for India, in saying so, he was referring to the president designate Dr.Kalam
.
Soon after
assuming the office of president of India, if my memory serves correct, Dr
Kalam was invited to attend the centenary celebration of the Indian Institute
of Science Bangalore. The event was
organized in a grand scale and to commemorate the occasion there was also an
exhibition organized on Tata legacy and the whole contingent of Board of Directors
of Tata Industries was descended on the lawns of the institute. The grandeur of
the occasion only seen to believed, there was also assemblage of India’s best
and brightest minds in the field of science and technology. The J N Tata
Auditorium was filled to the brim and to accommodate the overflowing crowd, TV
sets were installed in and around the auditorium area so that outside crowd can
view the program, which was being held in the auditorium. A scene still etched in my memory, that when
Dr. Kalam entered the hall, and while stepping onto the podium, audience
erupted with joy and gave standing ovation, claps echoed and reverberated the
hall and Dr. Kalam simply humbled by the gesture shown by such intellectually
sophisticated audience. It was simply stunning to see an occasion that a human
being commanding such highest attention and respect of the august gathering. Later he spoke about why IISc, being an elite
institution in the science and technology, not able to produce a single Nobel
laureate and he shared some of his thoughts and gave a road map to achieve the
excellence and bid for the coveted Nobel Prize.
As a proof
of Dr. Kalam’s simplicity and accessibility to common man, on one occasion, while
on my train journey, I fortuitously ran into a man who was sitting next to my
seat in the compartment, he was calm and was not that talkative initially, but
our journey was long and to beat that arduousness, he had to take refuge in
light banter with fellow passengers and in the process, I came to know about
him and during the course of journey our association solidified in terms of
knowing each other’s occupation, family and native place etc and he told sometime in the
early eighties he was chauffeur driving VIP’s of defense institutions in
Bangalore and he chauffeur drove Dr. Kalam many months during his stay in the
city, and Dr. Kalam was always courteous to him and the day came that he was
going back to Delhi then he had asked one day of his chauffeur driver’s family
and his well being and during which time he came to know about driver has had a
son who is in search of employment, and without second thought he had asked the
driver to provide his son’s details and helped his son securing an employment
in one of the prestigious institutions in Bangalore. For many of you reading
this article, it may sound that a kind of favoritism but he did not exercise
his power for the benefit of his kith and kin but to the benefit of the common
man of this country who was a contractual driver of his vehicle and made a
lasting difference to the drivers family. The driver while talking to me was at a loss
of words to describe Dr.Kalam’s goodness as a man.
Rrecently, I
happened to read a tribute from an eminent journalist, who unveiled in his
article many facets of former president’s personality and particularly he
highlighted one incident to emphasize his concern for ordinary people of the
country. Soon after the Independence Day celebration, it is customary for the president
of India to extend invitations to dignitaries from different walks of life to
be luncheon hosted at the famous lawns of mogul garden of Rastrapathi Bhavan. In
that connection a secretary presented a list of members invited on the occasion
to the president, while seeing the list Dr. Kalam expressed his surprise that
common employee finding no place and suggested to the secretary to alter the
list to add ‘Safai Karmacharis of the Indian Railways’ in the list of invites
and these class four laborers had an occasion to rub shoulders with country’s
eminent citizen during the luncheon program and also to see the presidential
palace. The journalist wrote the trend of inviting common employee of the
government of India to be part of the Independence Day luncheon continued while
he is in office.
When the
great man passed away, we heard cutting across party lines, all political
leaders paying rich tributes and shedding crocodile tears and powers that be
when they are in office had an opportunity continuing Dr.Kalam’s candidature
for the second term but it did not happen so and it has been the bane of India from
time immemorial and the country remained a poor one and ruled by rich political
class and continued to be a developing country. On the other hand, in the year
2008 during American Presidential election, for the democratic presidential candidature
Mr.Obama and Mrs.Hillary Clinton fought tooth and nail and Obama succeeded in
winning the nomination and subsequently became the President of America and
after assuming the office, the first thing he did, was an appointment of Mrs. Hillary
Clinton as his foreign secretary and that showed the country’s interest is his
priority even though an individual who contested against him.
In my view,
if Indian political leaders have the country’s best interest in their mind then
their opposition should end at the end of electioneering and whichever party
comes to the power cutting across the party lines best candidates to be chosen
for the ministerial positions and whatever their decisions be should be based on
the country first principle. Would that
happen in India? It’s only a fool’s dream.
Dr Kalam was
no doubt a great scientist and his achievements in the field endorse on the
same but he was a greater human. He did
not preach anything but just practiced whatever he believed in and was blessed with
purity, simplicity and humility. An
adage partly goes like this, what is it to be a success: To win the respect of intelligent
people and the affection of children and how true these words ring in the life
of Dr. Kalam. In his passing away, whole
country felt a kinship with him and his loss a void in their family. To conclude, many people made comparison of Dr.Kalam's persona with revered Mahatma Gandhiji but I can say one what Einsten said of Gandhiji to quote an adage, “Generation to come scarce believe that such a man
as this in flesh and blood walked upon this earth.” is also true of Dr. Kalam.
