Narendra Modi: A Man of Passion And The Human Touch

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Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who turns 75, is an astute politician, a seasoned administrator, and a strong taskmaster. But above all, he is a man of the masses, with both passion and compassion.  

I recall, immediately after taking over as Prime Minister, he was shocked by the disastrous floods in the Kashmir Valley. He rushed there, visited many inundated parts of Srinagar, and sent relief materials without delay. According to official inputs, the Centre provided Rs 1,875 crore in assistance. Within a year of his Prime Ministership, Modi was again tested by a severe tremor in neighbouring Nepal. Without delay, he sent men and materials. The IAF and NDRF were dispatched, food and medicines followed, along with engineers to help rebuild the devastated country.  

His instinct to stand with people in distress goes back to his early years. In 1979, when the Machchu dam breach killed thousands in Morbi, he was among the first RSS workers to reach the town. He organised and mobilised men and materials to ensure a decent funeral for the countless victims. Years later, in 2001, when Kutch was devastated by an earthquake on January 26, Modi — then BJP general secretary — rushed to the affected areas, camped in Bhuj and Anjar, and invited many industrialists to join in rebuilding efforts.  

Not all of his journeys were to natural disaster sites. As party general secretary, he rushed to Chattisinghpora, a remote village in Kashmir Valley after Pakistan-sponsored terrorists killed 36 Sikhs. At Chattisinghpora, he joined the prayer meeting at the Gurudwara, mourned with families, and appealed to the international Sikh community. After this tragedy, we met at the village where I shared the background and developments related to it. Later, as Prime Minister, he recalled the entire episode in remarkable detail while speaking to me about his stint in the Himalayan state. His memory is sharper than most contemporaries.  

In November 2023, he reminded me it was I who had telephoned him at Ashoka Road from Srinagar about the massacre. The timing was fraught — US President Bill Clinton was on a visit to India two days later, and the Government of India tried to underplay the killings.  

His compassion for common people grew even deeper when he became Prime Minister. At his first election meeting as PM candidate at Patna’s Gandhi Maidan on October 26, 2013, bombs exploded, killing six and injuring sixty. He dared to continue his speech in the face of serial explosions. Two days later, he came by helicopter to Alawalpur village, where I was also present, walked through the narrow and filthy lanes to reach the house of one of his young supporters, consoled the parents, and assured them of a job in the family. Even after eleven years, he recalled with grief in a telephonic conversation with me: “Ek naujawan jo mera supporter tha maara gaya, bahut dukh hua tha.”  

The years of his premiership brought fresh challenges. During COVID, Narendra Modi’s gesture in bringing Bangladeshi students back from Wuhan to their native country was appreciated internationally. He organised a virtual meeting of the SAARC heads of member countries, created an international fund, and arranged the sharing of experiences to fight the disease. Later, he arranged the evacuation of students from war-torn Ukraine free of cost on commercial planes, proving his compassion for the young. Over 100 countries, including Iran, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka, received India-made vaccines under the Vaccine Maitri scheme.  

From Morbi in 1979 to Vaccine Maitri in 2021, Narendra Modi’s journey shows a leader who stands by people in their hour of need — a leader of resilience, empathy, and unflinching commitment to the common man. His policies too reflected lived experiences. If the Ujjwala scheme to provide free LPG cylinders to housewives was introduced in the first term itself, it was because Narendra Modi had seen women cooking with wood logs in Gujarat and in the Himalayan states where he had served as party general secretary. The suffering of women stayed with him, shaping his concern for them.  

He tried to instill this approach in administrators. While addressing the civil services probationers at LBSNAA, Modi advised them to identify people’s problems at the micro level of administration and solve them. He even asked top bureaucrats to return to their initial rural postings, revisit the places they had left three decades ago, and guide their juniors by relearning ground realities.  

Discipline, too, has been his hallmark. In 1998, as party in charge for the assembly elections in undivided Madhya Pradesh, Modi stayed in a 14×10 size room on the ground floor of state BJP headquarters at Deendayal Upadhyay Parisar in Arera Colony, Bhopal. At that time, I was the Times of India Correspondent in MP. One morning, late Prabhat Jha, who was incharge of media, told me that party leader Sundar Lal Patwa wanted to meet me. Patwa ji expressed that he and other senior leaders, including former chief minister Kailash Joshi and leader of opposition Vikram Verma, were unhappy with Modi’s approach in the state.  

Next morning, I went to the party office and knocked at the door of the room in which Modi was accommodated. He opened the door and his first reaction was, “Law Kumar, do you have any recommendation for a party ticket?” When I replied in negative, he took me to the canteen on campus and after morning tea, I inquired about the concerns of the three leaders. Kaptan Singh Solanki, who went on to become Governor of Haryana and Raghunandan Sharma, who was given a Rajya Sabha nomination, were also present. He replied, “Patwa ji wanted a ticket for his nephew, Vikram ji for his wife and Joshi ji for his son. If the party starts obliging the kith and kin of leaders only, what will happen to our workers.” I suggested they were the founding fathers of Janasangh and Patwa was like his father figure, I also mentioned that if the discontent spread wide, the party might suffer. Later that evening, Patwa ji came to my Shivaji Nagar residence and informed me that the issue was amicably sorted. The BJP lost the elections for the very reasons Modi tried to control, but the episode revealed his resistance to dynastic pressures.  

As Chief Minister of Gujarat, Modi was not a copy book administrator, nor did he expect his bureaucrats to be. He was a man of strong likes and dislikes and disliked hearing “No” from officers on development issues. Those who supported his campaign for industrialisation and liberalisation received encouragement. In 2012, he launched a statewide Vivekanand Yatra before the assembly elections to attract the electorate and motivate them towards Hindutva.  

Yet the leader with firm discipline also carried the touch of the commoner. He and then Mayor of Rajkot, Vajubhai Vala, were once seen playing chess on a roadside Patiya (wooden platform) at Race Course Road near the AG office. He later contested his first assembly elections from Rajkot. The image of him seated on a wooden plank, engaged in a simple game of chess, remains as striking as his speeches from grand podiums.  

From the alleys of Morbi to the global stage of Vaccine Maitri, Narendra Modi’s life at 75 reflects not just politics, but memory, resilience, and empathy.