YOU WOULDN’T KNOW by looking at scruffy Vadnagar that it has a famous son. Tourists occasionally visit the walled part of the Gujarati town for its ornate wooden doors and balconies. A pair of stone gateways hints at a history stretching over two millennia. The town claims a mention in the Mahabharata, a saga of ancient India.
The railway station is single-track. Next to it, where the celebrity’s father once ran a tea stall, is a motorbike-repair shop. Over the road is his modest, whitewashed former school. Only in a street nearby, beyond a Sufi shrine, do you find hints of the great man. Neighbours all introduce themselves with the same surname: Modi, Modi, Modi.
Most of them recall something of the childhood of Narendra Modi, such as when he brought home a baby crocodile from a lake. They speak with respect more than fondness. He rarely helped his father with the tea stall. Friends from the school recall that he liked theatre and insisted on taking the part of a king. From childhood his passion was politics, and he soon joined the Hindu nationalist Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) movement. A fellow RSS member recounts a playground...
from The Economist: Special report http://ift.tt/1FzJWuv
No comments:
Post a Comment