Atal ji will live on in hearts and minds of every Indian: Modi
NEW DELHI: Paying his last respects to Bharatiya Janata Party stalwart Atal Bihari Vajpayee, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said he was an extraordinary personality who will live on in the hearts and minds of every Indian.
Modi said that no words can ever do justice to Vajpayee’s “rich contribution to the making of our country”.
“People came from all parts of India, from all sections of society pay tributes to an extraordinary personality who made an extraordinary contribution to the nation. India salutes you Atal Ji!,” Modi tweeted on Friday as the former prime minister’s mortal remains were consigned to flames here.
Earlier in a blog, Modi said India had found a leader in Vajpayee who was gifted in spirit, heart and mind.
In times of turbulence and disruption, a nation is blessed to have a leader who rises to become its moral compass and guiding spirit, providing vision, cohesion and direction to his people, he said describing him.
Vajpayee rescued the economy from the morass of the mid-1990s, when political instability at home and an uncertain global environment had threatened to derail a still incipient economic reforms process, he said.
“He sowed the seeds of much of the economic success that we have experienced over the past two decades. For him, growth was a means to empower the weakest and mainstream the marginalized. It’s that vision that continues to drive our government’s policy,” the prime minister said.
It was ‘Atalji’ who prepared the foundations of an India that is ready to take on the mantle of global leadership in the 21st century, he said.
Modi said he irreversibly changed India’s place in the world by overcoming “the hesitation of our nation, the resistance of the world and threat of isolation” to make India a nuclear weapons power.
Personally, Vajpayee was an ideal, a guru, and role model who inspired him deeply, he said.
It was Vajpayee who entrusted him with responsibilities both in Gujarat (as chief minister) as well as at the national level, Modi said.
“It was he who called me one evening in October 2001 and told me to go to Gujarat as chief minister. When I told him that I had always worked in the organisation, he said he was confident I would fulfil people’s expectations. The faith he had in me was humbling.” he said.
Hailing Vajpayee’s term as prime minister, Modi said India today is a self-assured nation, brimming with the energy of its youth and resolve of its people, eager for change and confident of achieving it, striving for clean and responsive governance, building future of inclusion and opportunity for all Indians.