Everyone knows James Bond throws the best party in town. It is one party I have been wanting to attend for years now. How frustrating it is to be the best spy in business and yet not get an invite to Bond’s dos. My sources say the MI-6 agent may throw the best parties but all is not well there. For instance, at the last party they didn’t put the right amount of vermouth in his martini. At another one, Kerala beef fry was undercooked, giving the dish a very bad name. If only I was there, nothing of this sort would have happened.
This is why I not just know Sreedharan’s pain but also feel it.
The Metroman has been waiting for that elusive invite to the one party he always wanted to be in, to serve under the one man he considers a true leader.
In the five-year buildup to 2014, Gujarat CM Narendra Modi had shown how a state is governed efficiently. You guys might question the claim today, but honestly most people bought it hook, line and sinker then. Modi was supposed to handpick meritorious people in his team. Many waited in vain for that phone call, probably Sreedharan did too.
Over the next seven years, there might have been many instances Sreedharan expected a call from his leader. Take the inauguration of Kochi Metro for instance. Modi came, shared a few awkward moments with Pinarayi Vijayan, cut a few ribbons and went back. There was no ‘moment’ between Sreedharan and Modi as one would have expected. No planted stories in the media about how the PM sought out the nation builder seeking his advice. I don’t know about Sreedharan, but it was a rude shock to the Metroman’s fans like me.
After all these years of snubs, Sreedharan probably decided to take matters into his own hands. With the help of the state unit of the BJP, he has gatecrashed into the party he longed to join.
Political commentators have been very soft on him. They have tried to psycho-analyse Sreedharan. They have described him as the technocrat par excellence, who, like his tribesmen, is afflicted by tunnel vision and is unable to see the social trends around him. This would have been true had he joined the BJP in 2014. But not today, after all those murders over food habits and disastrous policy decisions.
His interviews show Sreedharan is not the outsider out to practise a new brand of politics. Sreedharan in fact is trying to prove he is as true a Sangh insider as anyone can be.
There is no need to mollycoddle Sreedharan. It’s time journalists and commentators drop the kid gloves.
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