Eulogy for Arun Jaitley: Modern Day Chanakya & One Stop Trouble Shooter for BJP

Eulogy for Arun Jaitley: One Stop Trouble Shooter for BJP

The 24th, August 2019 @ 12.07PM, (IST) the date and time when the medical bulletin from AIIMS announced the tragic news of passing away of Arun Jaitley ji, will remain etched in my memory for an hitherto unknown experience. On this day, for reasons I thought was due to the Jet Lag that perhaps was not, I suddenly woke up at around 0300 hours local time at hotel in Binghamton, New York, where I had travelled for an official deputation with three of my NCSM colleagues. It was kind of a very strange experience since I am one of those who are hardly affected by a so called Jet Lag experience, when one travels to Europe and US. But then I began to believe that age has caught up with me and with it the Jet Lag. Since sleep eluded me completely- despite my best of efforts - I tried catching up with my Sainik school and engineering college friends on the whatsApp groups, which is the best of stress buster that connects us all including our families.

 There are few hyperactive friends in these two groups who are always online for chatting. When I logged on to the WhatsApp at around 0320 (Binghamton time) I noticed that Shirish Patil from my SSBJ 77 group and Bhagavathi from the HKE group had posted an important medical news bulletin from AIIMS in the group. It was the news of the passing away of Arun Jaitley, who the press release said had passed away @ 12.07 PM on the 24th August at the AIIMS where he was admitted. Binghamton, US, is 9 hours 30 minutes behind the Indian Standard Time, which meant that Arun Jaitley had passed away @ 0237 hours - Binghamton local time - on the 24th, August, just 23 minutes before I abruptly woke up. Was my untimely wake up kind of a premonition (sorry for being unscientific) with the news of Jaitley ji death or was it because of the natural biological Jet Lag phenomenon, I will leave the judgement to the readers and not be judgemental on this premonition - unscientific kind of an issue. I was one of those innumerable admirers of Jaitley and his death did affect me. My Sainik school friend Mr Gurupad Hegadi, a die hard supporter of the BJP was an ardent fan of Arun Jaitley. Gurupad served as the Principal of the Delhi Kannada School, which is located on the Lodhi Road and this position Donne ted him with most of the politicians and other top Kannadigas in Delhi and he had met Jaitley with some of the MPs of Karnataka and often times he used to talk about him. Gurupad post his voluntary retirement moved to Karnatak but then we remain in touch. He had kind of an ordered me that I must write an eulogy for Jaitley if he is unable to combat his illness and departs for his heavenly abode. I sent a message to Gurupad to see if he is awake and has seen this news. He was awake and he was actually glued to the TV watching the news about Jaitley cremation. He reminded me once again that I must post an eulogy for Jaitley. But then when I reminded him that I am out of the country and that I will do the needful on my return to India, he was insistent and therefore I had no way but to write this eulogy to adhere to the request of my friend Gurupad, a die hard fan of Arun Jaitley.

Whatever little information that I possess about Arun Jaitley, is based on the information that is available on the public domain. But then one of my Sainik School Bijapur friend, one year senior to me in school and an Ace Lawyer of national fame - Satish Maneshinde -  enriched our knowledge about Jaitley’s unique attributes and abilities, since Satish was friends with Arun Jaitley for more than three decades. Jaitley was one stop solution veteran for most of BJP problems, be it political (Rafale defence deal), economics (demonetisation and GST) or what have you. He defended his government with all the erudition and legal brain that he possessed and it was very difficult for the most belligerent opponent to silence Jaitley neither on legal terms or on sound political arguments. Such has been the reputation of Arun Jaitley and his trouble shooting qualities for the government.  It is also widely believed that Jaitley played a pivotal role in Modi ji shifting from state politics to national politics and the rest is history. Therefore it was no wonder that Modi ji became emotional while addressing the Indian community in Bahrain (where he was touring) when he received the news of the death of Jaitley,  and described Jaitley as his very close friend who was a political giant, towering intellectual and legal luminary and an articulate leader who made a lasting contribution to India.

Jaitley ji was admitted to the AIIMS on the 9th of August, just three days after the shocking death of his illustrious colleague Sushma Swaraj, for whom Jaitley had paid obituary respects in his tweet on the 6th of August, which unfortunately turned out to be the last but one tweet of Jaitley. The absence or lack of clarity on the medical condition of Jaitley, which AIIMS was releasing from time to time had created an apprehension that he may not make it. Most unfortunately this worst fear came knocking at Jaitley - the modern day Chanakya - to take him away to his heavenly abode on the 24th August at 12.27 PM, just minutes after I woke up at 0300 hours, at Binghamton, USA. His par excellence intellect and his outstanding articulations of BJP thoughts and ideologies - in which he had firm conviction - both in and outside the Parliament, proved to be the most effective combat for BJP to counter left and Congress leaning intellectuals, whose acerbic criticism of the Modi led BJP made national and international headlines, which often brought disrespect for the party.

Jaitley was a god sent delight for any party to have as a member and so it was with the BJP of which he was a member all through his political career, starting with his association with the ABVP. His handling of the Party Spokesperson’s responsibilities and so also his innumerable other responsibilities that the party bestowed him which kept him overly occupied with politics and the looser was his judicial career in which he was truly outstanding. He continued to share and contribute to his party’s interest till his very last breath. Even after he prematurely withdrew from party affairs, due to his health conditions, he continued to work for the party defending its decisions and ideologies through his most well reasoned and intellectually enriching blogs and cryptic, yet highly effective, tweets. His blog was delightful reading, perhaps even for those who were in complete disagreement with his points of view. There are very few, or may be none, in the BJP who have this unique quality of intellectually taking on their adversaries using the famed 'pen is mightier than the sword adage', which the left intelligentsia and the Nehruvian congress party and the followers of this ideology are famed not just in India but globally. Like most of the left leaning intellectuals and Nehruvian socialites and journalists, whose writings are normally picked up by most media both nationally and internationally to form an opinion, Jaitley’s writings too had this unique character. The past year or so has been a body blow for BJP, which has lost four of their most outstanding leaders ; Atal ji, Parrekar ji, Sushma ji and now Jaitley ji. It may take take a very long time for the party to come to terms with such back to back shocks.

Arun Jaitley will be remembered for the GST, which he managed to successfully pass through the parliament and while announcing the benefits of GST he had said, in his inimitable erudition style, “the old India was economically fragmented. The new India will create one tax, one market and for one nation”. The GST, notwithstanding some of the compulsive naysayers blaming it for the economic crisis in the industry - Rahul Gandhi described GST as Gabbar Singh Tax, a metaphor for terror tax -, was widely hailed as a game-changer for India's economy. The International Monetary Fund had said it could eventually add nearly two percentage points to India's growth. Although there have been several initial hiccups and many businesses have struggled to adapt to this new tax regime, yet the GST is on its path of taking firmer roots and is destined to be remembered as a crowning glory and a true legacy of Jaitley ji. Another major economic decision, the demonetisation, which many considered to be an abrupt move of Prime Minister Modi, which sent shock waves for the Indian economy, was also bravely faced by Jaitley. He repeatedly defended the move as essential to cracking down on tax evasion and promoting digital payments, calling it a "watershed moment" that Indians would look back on with pride, articulating his reasoning with fairly acceptable arguments. 

A lawyer by profession, Arun Jaitely was a key person in Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Cabinet during his first tenure and almost always acted as the chief trouble-shooter for the government. During the first five years of the Modi government, Arun Jaitley shouldered several important assignments including holding the portfolios of Finance Ministry, Corporate Affairs Ministry, Defence Ministry, and Minister of Information and Broadcasting at various times, including donning multiple hats of different portfolios simultaneously. Arun Jaitley ji was also the Indian Defence Minister besides he also held the Finance and Corporate Affairs ministry. Although he never kept good health, he was indispensable to Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Arun Jaitley had an enviable contacts across the political, legal and social spectrum, which he effectively used to support PM Modi, in the smooth passage of bills in the Rajya Sabha, where the BJP was in a minority. He was the go-to guy to keep the NDA running smoothly. He was Modi’s "eyes and ears". Perhaps it was too much for Jaitley to continue to shoulder such arduous responsibilities, while his health was failing him. Jaitley's deteriorating health including his kidney transplant in May 2018, compelled him to opt out of Modi's second government and active electoral politics but then before he could recuperate destiny had a different role set out for him in the heavenly abode where he now resides in eternal peace.
Leaders cutting across party lines were united in overwhelmingly paying extraordinary rich tributes to Arun Jaitley ji. Arun was one of those young student leaders who was jailed for taking part in student protests during the emergency period. He will be remembered for taking on the - hit and run striking man - Arvind Kejriwal, who has a compulsive allegation habit, which he used most effectively to make corruption and other allegations against all and sundry including Arun Jaitley. But then Kejriwal had to bite the dust and render an unconditional apology to Jaitley, who sued him for character assassination and false allegations. Not withstanding the fact that Kejriwal had hired - the one and only - Ram Jethmalani to defend him, yet Kejriwal had to accept defeat and render an unconditional apology and withdraw his false allegations. Such was the strength and power of conviction that Jaitley ji had in his integrity.
Now that Arun Jaitley is gone for his heavenly abode, yet one thing remains certain, his voice will continue to reverberate not just in the Parliament but all across India. Long live Jaitley ji. RIP.