This silence isn’t golden

Since the quality of cuisine was an integral part of authentic Avadh ambience, the chef Jiti Bhai inherited from his father, had the mixture of arrogance and expertise which placed him in the same category as Anatole in the Wodehouse framework.

The democratisation of the cuisine at Jiti Bhai’s table in recent years has been in direct proportion to his sinking deeper and deeper into UP and national politics. The transformation was gradual: an Avadh gentleman declining into an UP Congressman.

It was the wily Hemvati Nandan Bahuguna who put Jiti Bhai through his first political paces. That apprenticeship has been his priceless political asset, one that will add a great deal to the experience he accumulated in close proximity to Rajiv Gandhi and P.V. Narasimha Rao. And now as he digs his heels in to make an audacious political hovering between being and non-being, he deserves a hearing from the party cadres. Sitaram Kesri, 25 years his senior, came from a different stable. A backward caste man of the humblest beginnings, he joined the Congress Sewa Dal 60 years ago, remained on the margins of the party for years but came into his own during the Bihar movement led by Jayaprakash Narayan. Kesri was rallying his forces around Abdul Ghafoor, the Bihar Chief Minister who was the immediate target of JP’s movement. JP had invited me to stay with him in his house in Kadam Kuan, but it was his wife Prabhavati who generally screwed up her nose and asked about "bandmaster Kesri." The implication was that Kesrihad apparently played a trumpet or some such brass instrument during his Sewa Dal days, but in 25 years of association (since the Bihar movement) I never brought myself to confirming this somewhat embarrassing detail from Kesri.

With the exception of P.V. Narasimha Rao, Kesri was perhaps the wiliest political brain in that galaxy of obsequious Congressmen called the CWC. He was as deeply religious as he was secular. I have some empirical basis to say this because he visited me in South Delhi every time after his weekly darshan at the Chattarpur Mandir. So, he was not an atheist like Paswan.

In manner and speech he did not have Jiti Bhai’s class. In fact, he was awkward and clumsy, clearing his throat and spitting frequently into the plastic bag arranged in a bucket. It would make one’s stomach turn when his two Pomeranians came so close to the bucket that one felt they could inhale the rapidly accumulating muck.

It may have been a crafty sleight of hands that made him president but the undeniable fact is that he was also the first elected president in 42 years.

But once he was Congress president, the swords within the CWC were never really sheathed. Oh, the double talk. There was the diligent Pranab Mukherjee, drafting notes in Kesri’s Purana Qila house. Not just him. Every leader of the CWC trooping in, caps in hand and consulting him reverentially. But the minute they left his door the intrigues would resume.

Kesri knew what was going on. In fact, now that he is gone, a bitter truth can be told. Sitaram Kesri always mentioned Atal Bihari Vajpayee with greater respect than he did anyone of his CWC colleagues. His anxiety after the fall of the Babri Masjid was almost comical. He came rushing into my house at Gulmohar Park, holding onto his cap like it were about to be stolen. Kahin anshan na kar de, (what if Vajpayee goes on a hunger strike protesting against the mosque demolition) he whispered conspiratorially, slapping his sides with the sort of excitement that bordered on glee. "What will happen if Vajpayee goes on fast?" I asked.

"The Congress led by these mother… would be dead," he said triumphantly. I had heard comparable four letter words and expletives strung together in such a complete composition only from the late Ramnath Goenka. He was disgusted the way "the party of vested interests" was being run. The insensitivity to the caste question pained him. Look how quickly the BJP had sought to dispel its upper caste image. After all, it was the BJP which had enabled Mayawati to become chief minister. Call it crafty orchestration, but Bangaru Laxman’s elevation to the post of the party president was a bold decision. Little wonder folks like Paswan had switched. Kesri could never really recover from the unseemly haste with which he was ousted from the party presidentship. What astounded him was that caste prejudice in the party "was even stronger than the lure of power."

After the elections in March 1999, he as party president had led the delegation to the president and asked for time. He could well have become prime minister. Within hours a coup was staged of which Sonia Gandhi was the central figure. The very same Pranab Mukherjee, who sat around Kesri drafting his notes, went around the party office ensuring that every nameplate bearing Kesri’s name was removed.

That was Sonia Gandhi’s contribution to the democratisation in the party. This is the point Jitendra Prasada is making, though not in so many words.

Sonia Gandhi led the party into the 1999 elections and returned with 120 seats, the lowest in the party’s history. She does not meet the press. There is no evidence that she can think serious thoughts. Ben Johnson said, "Language most reveals a man, speak, that I may see thee." Sonia Gandhi has never revealed herself. She must have watched all those vigorous debates in the US elections. I hope she agrees that that is democracy. Isn’t there an idea here for Sonia and Jiti Bhai — even within the party forum.

As Jitendra Prasada digs his heels in to make an audacious political hovering between being and non-being, he deserves a hearing from the party cadres.