THE MAN WITH A ROSE

Today marks the 135 birth anniversary of an icon who set upon himself the task of building a newborn nation, right from the 'labour room' as it were. Tattered and bruised, and clandestinely divided by a colonial power, Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, India's first prime minister, steered her onto a highway that led to a modern India, an India equipped to cope with challenges of the future...

A prolific intellectual, demonstrable through his works both pre and post independence, Nehru sought to have a continuum of ancient and modern India. A man of action and with a vision, it can be said that Nehru’s focus on higher education and heavy industry bailed the country out to a large extent despite her limited resources...

Nehru’s India trode on after his demise in 1964, with ups and downs, but the legacy of that pioneer got lost somewhere down the line. Despite three wars, economic progress, nuclear tests and other advances, the fervour of the days of Nehru's India seems to have ebbed away...

Going by the various present day utterances and rhetoric from several quarters, including the social media, of India's historical past including the Independence Movement, it has become fashionable to undermine Nehru’s contributions. To err is human, and so was Nehru. What he failed to do, or erred, as a prime minister is far less that what he had achieved...

A spontaneous mingler and media-friendly personality, Nehru was known to extend his support for any good cause, almost anywhere. His birth anniversary is known as "Children's Day" in India...

One may or may not concur with his thinking and ideologies, but there is hardly any evidence that Nehru did not do what he did for the general prosperity of his nation at that point in time...

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