When Advani oversaw a book production
Idid not know LK Advani personally until 1999 when he was home minister. How we met and worked closely had nothing to do with politics, but reveals a little-known facet of a man, now 95, who was one of the principal architects of the rise of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), but now lives in almost complete isolation.
Advani, in the midst of his phenomenally busy schedule as home minister, was keen on a book on New Delhi. He felt that New Delhi had evolved from a small colonial city, built by the British as a statement of imperial might, to a cosmopolitan metropolis presiding over the destiny of a free India and the world’s largest democracy. He wanted a book that captured this new self-conscious personality of New Delhi.
His home secretary then was BP Singh, who readily endorsed the project, and convened a meeting in North Block of people who were knowledgeable about Delhi. I was then joint secretary in the ministry of external affairs, but because some of my books were on the Capital, including The Havelis of Delhi, I received an invitation to attend.
The meeting was at 10am on a weekend in December 1998, but it completely slipped my mind. In fact, I was playing golf at Rashtrapati Bhavan, when an aide of Advani called to remind me. It was too late to go home and change, so I went to the ornate conference room in North Block in my golf attire. There were a dozen people or so gathered there, including Raghu Rai, Mark Tully and OP Jain, a venerable Delhiwallah. I was the youngest present and, not surprisingly, was asked to draft an outline of the book, which I made and sent over to BP Singh later.
For weeks thereafter, I heard nothing further on the matter. One evening, at a party hosted by the late Chandan Mitra, BJP Member of Parliament (MP) and friend from St Stephen’s College, Advani was present. When he spotted me, he walked purposefully towards me and asked, “Pavan-ji, what is happening about the book?” I told him I didn’t know, but had sent the draft outline long ago. By then, BP Singh had been replaced as home secretary by Kamal Pande. Advani firmly said, “Tomorrow, Kamal will call you.”
Sure enough, the next day, Kamal Pande called me to North Block, and took me straight away to see the home minister. From then on, Advani was like a general in charge, overseeing the production of the book. We met frequently, and he would often call me directly on the mobile phone. Oxford University Press was designated as the publisher, and a list of subjects and authors was finalised. Finally, the book was out at the end of 2000.
Now, Advani wanted it to be appropriately launched, and asked me if, given my earlier stint as press secretary to the President of India, the book could be launched in the Ashoka Hall of Rashtrapati Bhavan by President KR Narayanan. I told him that, to the best of my knowledge, the Ashoka Hall was never the venue for book launches, but the decision was at the discretion of the President, and he could write to him. Advani asked me to draft a letter, which he sent to Narayanan. The President agreed.
In February 2001, The Millennium Book on New Delhi, edited by BP Singh and me, was unveiled at the Ashoka Hall in Rashtrapati Bhavan by the President in what was labelled as the mother of all book launches. The entire Cabinet was there, a great number of ambassadors, MPS, Supreme Court judges, journalists and people of eminence from all walks of life. So was, naturally, Prime Minister Atal
Bihari Vajpayee. As he walked in, he stopped next to me, enigmatically smiled and whispered, “Suna hai aapne is kitab pe bohat kaam kiya hai [I hear you have done a lot of work on this book].”
It was an eventful literary year. On December 25, 2001, I came from Cyprus, where I was ambassador, for the launch of Vajpayee’s book, Twenty-one Poems, which on his request, I had translated into English. But how that came about is another story.