Khurana was sabotaged by Advani to help Sheila Dikshit

Former Governor, Union Minister and erstwhile Delhi Chief Minister, Madan Lal Khurana was deeply committed towards the welfare of the common masses, and his unflinching belief in political correctness often landed him in trouble with the Bharatiya Janata Party’s central leadership. He was even silently sabotaged in his bid to get a second term in office by top guns in the BJP. His contrarian streak was visible when he emerged as the champion of Keshubhai Patel in 2001 and sought that he should remain Chief Minister of Gujarat. It was only after Khurana was relieved of the responsibilities as the BJP general secretary in-charge of the state by then president, Jana Krishnamurthy (acting on the instructions of A.B. Vajpayee and L.K. Advani) that Narendra Modi was asked to take over the hot seat in a damage control exercise on 7 October 2001, with a fuming Patel consigned to the sidelines.

Khurana, who passed away last week, did not harbour any personal grudge against Modi, but when he was approached by top party leaders with the request to back Modi being made the Chief Minister, Khurana asked them on what basis he could justify his elevation to the top post when he (Modi) had never been an elected representative. He conveyed to the growing number of backers of Narendra Modi that there was “no vacancy” in Gujarat and that Patel was “firmly in control” of the situation, contrary to media speculation.

Modi, who was the mascot during the Kanyakumari to Srinagar Ekta Yatra led by Dr Murli Manohar Joshi and had subsequently accompanied L. K. Advani on his Yatra, remained the strongest contender. L. K. Advani mounted pressure on Jana Krishnamurthy and made him assign Khurana some other responsibilities instead of being in-charge of Gujarat. His supporters were able to convince Atal Bihari Vajpayee through a close family member, and were happy that Advani wanted to replace Patel as the Chief Minister with Modi.

Khurana was extremely distraught with the development and shared his discontentment with a select few journalists with whom he shared a good rapport. But when Khurana’s eldest son Vimal passed away, Modi telephoned his wife Van- dana to convey his heartfelt condolences.

In his six- decade- long public career, Khurana had many run-ins with powerful people. Soon after he was elected as Delhi Chief Minister in 1993, Mukesh Ambani visited his official residence at 33, Sham Nath Marg in Civil Lines. The Reliance Group was proposing to set up a power plant at Bawana in North Delhi and he was hopeful that he would get the requisite permission. Khurana told a few journalists with whom he was close that he was taken aback when some of his guests enquired about his son and offered to make him a partner in some business venture. Vimal, who had been introduced to the country’s richest industrialist, informed him that he was content with whatever he was doing. After Mukesh Ambani left, Khurana marked the file for comments to former Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG), T.N. Chaturvedi, who had joined the BJP. After going through it, Chaturvedi marked some red lines which Khurana agreed to while rejecting the proposal.

For this rebuff, backers of the Ambanis never forgave Khurana and were said to have influenced both Atal Bihari Vajpayee and L. K. Advani, to retract their decision of appointing Khurana as the Chief Minister again on 9 October 1998. Of course, this is only conjecture, and there may have been other reasons for Khurana’s failure to land the job a second time. The late Union Minister, Pramod Mahajan convinced Vajpayee and Advani that to prevent Khurana and his bête noire Sahib Singh Verma from quarrelling, it would be prudent to appoint Sushma Swaraj as a non-controversial Chief Minister. This way, the shrewd and perceptive Mahajan managed to ease out