At least once in a year, media houses rate Chief Ministers of India. Odisha figures prominently because Naveen Patnaik has bagged the prize a couple of times. Highly-adored CMs like Manohar Parrikar, Manik Sarkar et al have lost to Patnaik. Modi could not even come close when he was heading Gujarat. Mamata Banerjee scores only on exterior simplicity due to inexpensive sarees and Hawaii chappals, but she is arrogant and too talkative and wrongly revengeful. She does not even take healthy criticism in her stride. Parrikar and Sarkar are truly praiseworthy for exceptional integrity and prompt action.
But Patnaik beats all on one very important score: reticence. He is so cool about ‘who is saying what’ that people imagine he is either heartless, meaning there is no emotion in him or he is just not bothered about the world around him. All the same, he has managed well to endear himself to his people. Knowledgeable critics say he wins election because there is no good enough opposition party. Even when a Modi wave was madly strong, Arvind Kejriwal and Patnaik smashed the BJP to dust. Kejriwal did magnificently well, but still Patnaik is a strange magician. Patnaik is perceived as a uniquely clean guy. He wears the simplest dress and doesn’t throw his weight around. His aides report all critical developments to him and he takes the final decision. Contrary to the popular belief that he knows nothing about what Odisha needs urgently, it is an established fact that he decides what’s best for people as per his wish, which may not be very objective at times. He has clear instructions to his team members about what they should not do to defame him. His sharp-headed administrators guide him cautiously because they know he is temperamentally suspicious like many rulers in history.
Naveen took Pyari Mohapatra for his guts and aggression. Pyari cleansed the outfit of dirt and filth. The BJD appeared a serious do-good party quite at the beginning. One after the other, the tainted ones were shown the door or ignored so terribly that they would not want to show up again. Many except Bijay Mohapatra have been lost in oblivion. The young ones of today cannot recognise Ramakrishna Patnaik or Kamala Das. When Pyari got ambitious due to the false belief that only because of him the party got strong, he was shown the door too. People thought the BJD would crumble overnight as Pyari declared war. He was first shocked that Naveen could do that to him. Some jokers spread the rumour that the drama was methodically planned for consolidating the party further.
Incidentally, Pyari had rightly gauged the worth of the BJP then and curtly trashed the national party’s bargain for more seats than offered and eventually showed them the exit from the coalition. Ever since that moment, the Vajpayee-less saffron party has been cursing the BJD biggies and planning a massive hit-back in vain. After the 2012 ‘Pyari debacle’, people kept expecting the BJD’s decay and decadence, but nothing of the sort ever happened. Political analysts forecast that the 2014 election would witness the fall of Naveen because the strategist had gone. Some Modi teammates celebrated victory before the battle and were sure the sizeable BJP presence in the legislature would be potent enough to arm-twist Naveen into agreeing with them on most critical issues. The results showed an unbelievable magic number. Odisha people told the world, “Naveen is fine, no replacement necessary.”
It became evident by now that Pyari was never indispensable. Pyari lost credibility only because he kept saying the failsafe missile was being launched soon. But no fume or fire ever emerged. Pyari cronies like Pravat Biswal and Sarada Nayak and the Jatni guy said they would not desert their heroic mentor but had to prostate sooner than expected. The biggest Pyari beneficiaries namely Dasburma and Arun Sahoo had purposefully played Brutus right at the start because they knew some secrets shared by the mentor in good faith and they abused trust to give Pyari away. Younger, more loyal bureaucrats stood by Naveen and have been guiding him superbly ever since. It’s also true some of the best brains could not take the blind ‘Yes Sir’ route and slipped away from the scene cleverly. Naveen neither pleaded with them to stay on nor wept over the loss. He organised fresh backup teams. One or two officials have proven to be too sharp and indisputably loyal to him. So, there is big murmur within the party of a bureaucratic Government rather than a democratic one in which elected reps play key roles.
This story is not intended to deify Naveen; it’s only to share some absolute truths. Bijubabu became a legend when age was not on his side. He mingled with the masses but bungled on critical decisions. So, he kept paying heavy prices. He was moved by whims, but Naveen is stirred by logic. Betrayers, backstabbers and detractors got away with Bijubabu. Naveen fixes all adversaries systematically to best advantage.
Talking of political leaders, state skills and integrity, one has to look up the late Kamaraj, who rose from labour class to Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu. A self-opinionated Nahru too had great respect for him. The Congress made Kamaraj its leader who first imposed the one-person-one-post principle. An executive head cannot hold the party president’s post. This was in the early 1960s and Bijubabu had to step down under the Kamaraj Plan. Naveen would be deified should he adopt that ethical principle now. He pulls the votes; all other winners are beneficiaries only. The day Naveen abandons, the BJD would die in the same time as a fish thrown out of water.
Kamaraj never knew English but moved Nehru at all times because of his commonsense approach. Before becoming CM, there was a two-shift scheme in elementary schools, one for regular teaching and the other would have students sent home to learn the traditional community occupations though it became controversial for being a casteist scheme. Public opposition and internal dissent in the Congress resulted in closure of the scheme. Even Congress legislators forced the resignation of Rajaji as Chief Minister. The former CM shut many schools due to insufficient funds. Once Kamaraj came to power, he ordered abolition of the ‘hereditary education scheme’ and established more new schools so that everyone had a school within 5 km of one’s village. He had made education free for all. Those days, poor children had to work for food. So he introduced the Midday Meal Scheme. He ordered to construct new dams and reservoirs across Tamil Nadu bringing 10 million acres under cultivation. After him, no politician has put up a major reservoir in Tamil Nadu. Kamaraj had established several State-owned companies including paper mills, cement factories, railway coach yards and more.
After Nehru, he became Congress president. Instead of becoming PM himself, he made lal Bahadur Shastri and Indira Gandhi Prime Minister. He is remembered today as the greatest and most selfless ‘kingmaker’ among Indian politicians.
Naveen as a uniquely popular leader must start sharing some power among the few select high-integrity political colleagues as there is literally no threat to him in any manner. He is absolutely invincible.
(The writer is a core member of Transparency International, Odisha)