I was privileged to fortuitously meetthe eleventh President of our country Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam as we were landing from the same flight from Chennai. He had not become the President yet. As I folded my hands to say my greetings, he invited me to shake hands. That was the humility of the great man. I also had the scope of knowing about him from his junior colleague and co-author Dr. Y.S. Rajan, who had a stint as the Vice Chancellor of Jalandhar Technical University. However, I was handed in a real opportunity to study a bit about Dr. Kalam when I was invited to deliver a keynote address on 20 February by Citizen’s Human Rights Clinic (CHRC), Odisha and Ambedkar International Centre, Bhubaneshwar. The occasion consisted of three different functions; one, it was the World Social Justice Day, second, it was the 9th National Human Rights Conclave of CHRC and third, release of the book on Dr. Kalam entitled, ‘A Blazing Beacon’.

Dr. Kalam has made several speeches as the President of India, wrote number of books as a scholar and spoke on numerous occasions especially to the youth as a teacher and a motivator. He is said to have met 15 million youths during and after his presidency. Also, trees of writings about Dr. Kalam are available in the public domain. I focused in my lecture on five points unique about Dr. Kalam, his work and his life.
First, Dr. Abdul Kalam was not a politician when he occupied the office of the President and became the first citizen of the country. All the Presidents, before and after Kalam were all politicians or were ministers in the Union Cabinet before assuming the office of the President. Interestingly, in an interview, Pranoy Roy, the television proprietor and presenter asked Dr. Kalam, whether, in his (Dr. Kalam’s) view, the President should be a politician or a non-politician. Dr. Kalam very candidly replied, “All presidents before me have brought their respective core competences to the office of the President, so there is no professional problem, but any President of India should be a good human being”. In other words, it is not the office of the President that adorns the person; it is the personality of the person occupying it that elevates the institution. No doubt, Dr. Kalam redeemed the office of the President by the sheer force of his personality.
Second, he was a consensus candidate. In 2002, when he became the President, politics in India was bitterly divided between Bharatiya Janata Party running the Union government and the Opposition. In ideological terms, BJP was pejorativelyconsidered right-wing and the rest Left wing or Centre-Left. Dr. Kalam was then perceived to represent hope and inspiration at the time of widespread cynicism and resentment. Given his non-controversial background and sparkling professional profile, all political parties across the board endorsed his candidature. This was historic.
Third, he was the people’s President converting Rashtrapati Bhawan to people’s bhawan. President’s office is associated with rituals and ceremonies that hark back to the past upto colonial times. Dr. Kalam defied the vice-regal protocols and opened his office to common people – the farmers, the policemen, the postmen, the students, all and sundry. In view of the movement of the people, in and out of the Rashtrapati Bhawan, it was called people’s bhawan and the President, the people’s President.
Fourth, he wanted to be known as a teacher although he was a statesman, scientist, technologist and a teacher – all roled into one. Dr. Kalam emphasised the critical importance of the process of learning and the profession of teaching. In fact, he had composed a couplet which he fondly called a poem on creativity, “learning gives creativity that leads to thinking, which provides knowledge and that makes you great”. For him, learning was a life-long process. He was once asked about the state of education in India. His reply was that he was not so worried about the secondary and the higher education. His concern was the primary education where minds and the personalities of children were shaped. He underlined the need of having creative classroom setting, creative syllabus and creative teachers in the schools.
On his introduction, he preferred to be called a teacher although out of all his vocations, he had a brief stint in teaching. He said he was inspired by one of his teachers, who was able to inspire them and taught them how to dream. That was when he was in Presidency College, Madras where he learned to dream and construct visions. He said later that vision elevates the person as well as the nation.
One of his quotes, a bit complex, is, the best brains can come from the last bench of the class. Once as he was meeting students in a higher secondary school, a young girl asked him if he could explain this statement. Dr. Kalam had a sense of humour too. He immediately quipped, “Because I was in the last bench”. He qualified it by saying he was in the last bench as well as often in the front. The philosophy behind the statement was that every student has some talent which will flower at some point albeit differently for each of them. So, a teacher should not care whether the student is in the last or the first bench or whichever bench it may be. The teacher should pay equal attention to all students. That is the dharma of a teacher.
Fifth, He was the icon of the young India. Pt Jawaharlal Nehru was fond of children but Abdul Kalam concentrated his energies, experience and knowledge on enlightening the youth and motivating them. The titles of his books resonated with the feelings and aptitude of the youth; The Wings of Fire and Ignited Minds. He had a rock-star aura among the youth and his attractive and unusual hairstyle helped it. He was one of the best-selling authors for the youth; he swayed their minds and was in a permanent conversation with them. He was a guide, a friend and a teacher to the youth; almost a role model. With his profound philosophical as well as practical approach to life, he became a motivation guru for many.
Dr. Kalam transformed his image from a ‘missile man’ to a people’s President. He spent his life in relentless pursuit of a better tomorrow and a greater India. The best way to remember him is to read and re-read his interviews, quotable quotes, speeches, books and memoirs. In my small exercise mentioned above, I did a bit of reading him and believe me, I felt elevated and inspired by his life and times.

Email:------------- dr.dkgiri@gmail.com