The Man who called himself Socialist

George Fernandes, fiery former "socialist" and the 'Right' hand man of the NDA, is as Janus faced as the man whom he helped to hoist for six years- Atal Bihari Vajpayee.

Indian Express sums up well the man who had the chutzpah to proclaim himself a socialist while helping to prop up the most right wing government in India.

I hope his loss of the Presidentship of the JDU (S) is really his political obituary.

Here was a man who espoused Socialist politics and went on to broker a rightwing political arrangement that presided over the country for six years. Here was a man who took on the might of the Indian state, and went on to become one of its pillars. Here was a man who threatened to blow up railway tracks, and went on to become a railway minister. Here was a man who had once sharply criticised the Babri Masjid demolition and went on to defend Narendra Modi’s handling of the Gujarat riots. Here was a man who talked of world peace and Hiroshima, but found himself the country’s defence minister during Pokhran II. Here was a man who dropped out from Catholic priesthood and went on to offer a whitewash of an inquiry report on the heinous killing of Australian missionary, Graham Staines, and his two sons.

His profile at Wikipedia is hagiographic by any standards.

Tags: India, Politics, George Fernandes, Hindutva