Shri Lal Krishna Advani Ji enters the hundredth year of his life today, 8th November. This year, his birthday fittingly coincides with Diwali, a festival associated with Prabhu Shri Ram and the Diya at a time when we are marking 75 years since the inception of the Jana Sangh, 125th Jayanti of Dr. Syama Prasad Mookerjee and recently celebrated a hundred years of the RSS. There are very few people whose lives have touched so many different chapters of modern India. Advani Ji was born on 8th November 1927, on Dev Deepawali. As a youngster in 1947, he experienced the pain of leaving behind his familiar world in Sindh. He rebuilt his life from scratch without bitterness. This trait of being able to build from scratch, against all odds, has stayed with him throughout. It was seen while he was strengthening the Jana Sangh and later building the BJP. His tenures as BJP President saw the Congress falling sharply from 400 to below 200 in 1989 and the BJP becoming the single largest party for the first time in 1996. Advani Ji nurtured generations of Karyakartas and gave the Party a clear foundation rooted in the principle of Nation First. Two qualities always set Advani Ji apart as a leader. First, his ideological clarity and intellectual sharpness. This was reflected in his speeches and writings. The Jana Sangh and BJP resolutions he authored remain worth reading even today, while his interviews were consistently incisive and precise. Second, the manner in which he exposed the pseudo-secularism propounded by a large section of the Indian polity for many years. Advani Ji took up every responsibility with immense diligence. As an RSS Pracharak, Advani Ji first worked in different parts of Rajasthan. From there, he went to the national capital, where he started working closely with Atal Ji. History shows that it is rare for two towering political leaders to work together for several decades, cooperating with each other without becoming competitors. Advani Ji and Atal Ji set a remarkable example. Together, they changed the course of Indian politics. The Delhi that Advani Ji came to was coming to terms with the horrors of Partition. He immersed himself in making the Jana Sangh stronger. In 1967, Advani Ji became the Chairman of the Delhi Metropolitan Council, where he worked alongside the late Vijay Kumar Malhotra Ji (who became Chief Executive Councillor). In 1970, Advani Ji’s Parliamentary innings began. His interventions have won appreciation across the political spectrum. He made a mark as an MP and later, as Leader of Opposition in both houses and from the treasury benches too. Despite parliamentary commitments, he frequently travelled across India meeting people. I vividly recall the 1991 Lok Sabha elections. It was decided that Advani Ji would contest the Lok Sabha elections from two seats, one of which was Gandhinagar. He had an old link with Gujarat. His father had settled in Kutch after Partition. Advani Ji had also served as a Rajya Sabha MP from Gujarat. So, it was a homecoming of sorts. Being involved in the BJP organisation, I had the honour of helping prepare his papers and assisting him throughout the campaign. The people of Gandhinagar sent him to Parliament time and again. As a voter of Gandhinagar, I also had the honour of voting for Advani Ji on numerous occasions. The care and attention he devoted to his constituency is something to learn from. The Emergency was a watershed moment in Advani Ji’s life. He was at the forefront of saving democracy and protecting the Constitution. His experiences found their way into his book, ‘A Prisoner’s Scrap-Book.’ One part of that book, titled ‘A Tale of Two Emergencies’, beautifully explained the striking similarities between the events in India starting June 1975 and those in Nazi Germany in 1933. Advani Ji was a fiery Opposition leader but an equally excellent administrator. When the Janata Government came to office in 1977, Advani Ji became Minister for Information and Broadcasting
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