When Dharmendra Pradhan became Petroleum Minister, Odias rejoiced like mad. Dhjarmendra is a decent, sobre guy with very impressive track records of a well-meaning politician.
He is one of the youngest in the Modi brigade. A Master in Anthropology, Dharmendra is certainly not named after the famous Hindi movie star Dharmendra Deol, also a BJP leader with wife Hemamalini. Dharmendra, as his parents named him, means the ‘emperor of righteousness’. Much like his politician father Debendra Pradhan, he is a born social worker.
Dharmendra is a politician from Dhenkanal who worships the nearly-forgotten Baji Rout, Odisha’s kid martyr who laid down life to attain freedom from despotic princely rulers of Dhenkanal when the rebellion against Gadjat kings was gaining momentum in the 1920s and 30s. This great sentiment for the true heroes makes Dharmendra a very special Odia who attains glory to be shared by the entire Odia community.
Baji Rout was born in 1925 and was killed in 1938 at a very tender age only for defying the king’s soldiers when asked to ferry them across the river Brahmani. Dharmendra is from the same historic district of Dhenkanal whose heart still aches when Baji Rout is discussed.
The UPA political executive was unforgivably slavish to the Ambani family, choosing Petroleum Ministers to ensure incredible private benefits. Successive Petroleum Ministers, until S Jaipal Reddy appeared on the scene, had merrily surrendered to the whims of the private sector, no matter how much loss they caused to the nation.
Reddy was a very scrupulous person who did not compromise on ethical principles. He was a true executive member of the UPA outfit who made it clear to the world that he would call all his shots himself.
The whole petroleum community in India was stunned at the extraordinary courage demonstrated by Reddy, who had smelt many a rat quite on arrival. Reddy had refused to clear RIl’s highly inflated annual budget for the KG basin development spending; said NO to the proposal for extra monetary benefits by finding a production-recovery cost mismatch; turned down a mid-term price revision for gas job from the KG basin, blocked D6; kept the RIl—BP deal waiting indefinitely; refused pointblank to issue a commercial certificate for exploration of the N60 block in the Mahanadi basin; laughed off the request for extension of exploration time in the Cauvery basin; and most sternly refused to accept the RIl’s coal-based methane pricing mechanism.
All this is history now. Ambani could be a blue-eyed boy to all growth-loving PMs like Modi. He is also a Gujarati likely to melt Modi’s heart more easily than a tycoon from Kerala or Odisha. But Modi is no-nonsense in his approach to development. He places country first and any other individual next. Growth is not bland economic growth. It has to have the ‘quality of life’ ingredient deeply carved out on the designs.
Modi knows the pains of the common man because he has lived for some time as a ‘Chaiwala’. Dharmendra is too sensitive to the suffering of the poor. Or else, he would not keep Baji Rout in his heart even today when the rest of the world would not be able to make clear who that name belongs to — a business tycoon or a long-lost kid martyr long, long time ago in a nondescript remote village of Odisha.