Throughout his eight-day African safari, the one theme President Abdul Kalam harped on was ‘‘connectivity’’. In Tanzania, at the university of Dar-es Salaam, he spoke of his vision to connect the urban with the rural via technology to spur harmonious growth. And to the Indian diaspora, he assured it more ‘‘connectivity’’ with the people back home—in the form of experts in health, education and science and technology. In his address to the Pan African Parliament in Johannesburg, South Africa, it was ‘‘e-connectivity’’ that won him a standing ovation. The idea he mooted was to connect 53 nations of the African Union by satellite and fibre optic network, a mammoth project that would take about three years to instal and cost $50 million. But it took former RBI Governor Bimal Jalan to sum up this momentous visit — the first to South Africa by any Indian President. ‘‘I have been on several such foreign missions with dignitaries. But what set this one apart is the manner in which our President was able to make a human connection wherever he went. Be it at state banquets or his interaction with children, his humility and humanism was infectious. It made us all proud.’’Mahatma’s legacy• At the Constitution Hill, which now houses South Africa’s highest court of the land that guarantees its citizens human rights, is a museum that’s a chilling reminder of the apartheid past. Both Gandhi and Mandela were imprisoned here. Apart from the horrifying isolation cells at Number Four, there are three drums that have been neatly ensconced in glass cages. They were called Congress 1, 2 and 3, denoting the type of food that was to be served to the whites, coloured and blacks—meat and soups were saved for the first group, while stale fish and vegetables made it to the plates of others down the line. Such meticulous recording of history was also on display at Gandhiji’s Tolstoy Farm where his house Sarvodya has been rebuilt and restored after it was destroyed in apartheid violence in 1985. For India, therefore, there are are lessons to be learnt from South Africa in its single-minded devotion to preserving the Mahatma’s legacy. In fact, Ila Gandhi, a grand-daughter of the Father of the Nation, met Kalam in Durban and voiced her own concern about how ‘‘India is forgetting Gandhi’’. The President, of course, tried in his own way to convince her about the measures being taken in India to resurrect cottage industries and khadi, but the question is how convinced are we of our own efforts?• One of the best parts of travelling with the President is the flight. Air India-1 had laid out the red carpet for us all. Not just in terms of the lunch and dinner spreads, but pride in every member of the crew for being part of this special journey was palpable. Captain Deepak Anand was in command and he led by example. Three days before our return flight to New Delhi from Durban, news reached him that his mother had passed away. ‘‘I could have left immediately. but I chose not to. I wanted to complete the ‘mission’ at hand,’’ Captain Anand told me when I met him in the cockpit. ‘‘I will cherish my mother’s life. More than a mother, she was friend.’’ President Kalam met him too the moment he heard. A mother’s loss is irreparable, he told him, and expressed his sincere appreciation for the dignity with which Captain Anand had handled personal loss in the line of duty.In fact, the entire crew seemed to be hooked on this spirit of service. From champagne and caviar to utthappam and upma, every individual taste and whim was catered to by the team of in-flight supervisor Ravi Shukla, flight pursers Firoz Mistry and Suhail Massod and air hostesses Karuna and Neema. In fact, one Delhi-based south Indian journalist’s sudden mid-air craving for thair sadam (curd rice) was also fulfilled! Thank you, Air India.Disaster, at lastWe had been warned by the High Commissioner. Carry some money with you when you walk the streets of South Africa. So, if you are mugged in Cape Town or Jo’berg or Durban, you can give it all up and save yourself some trouble. Trouble? Only yesterday, two teenagers pleaded guilty in a Durban court for stabbing and killing a 55-year-old man after they robbed him of a lighter and two rand (about Rs 14). No one was taking any chances. We were all staying indoors after sunset. But disaster struck. Durban’s Holiday Inn Elangeni proved no safer than the wild outdoors. In the half hour I had left room 1901 to send what would be my last dispatch from the media centre downstairs, my room was burgled and the laptop gone! The police was called and a printout of the room access report obtained. Electronic keys don’t mean a thing, only that the report showed a suspicious entry using a different key. Bala Naidu, head of police in KwaZulu-Natal, came to see me off the next day promising to do something. But what can you do in SA where even a five-star hotel is not above board? SHANTANU DATTA
