Modi is a different man today than the one I met ages ago

It was on a printed page that I was in fleeting proximity to Narendra Damodardas Modi. We were on the popular Times of India feature called "Black and White" together.

I don't remember for sure at this distance in time, if he was black and I was white, or the other way round. I do remember, though, that it was the controversy generated by the proffered visit of the US ambassador for religious freedom to India. I argued, as I was asked to, in favour of the visit.

Therefore, very likely, I must have been in the "white". I also remember that my antagonist on the printed page did argue well, despite being "in the black".

The overwhelming impression that I gathered from that experience was that this "black and white" business was an artificial construct.

We consented to position ourselves as antagonists only because the media wanted us to. We were (at least I was) tailoring my views to fit into the column, in tone and texture.

I was not able to reflect, fully and faithfully, my views on religious freedom - freedom of religion as well as freedom from religion - within the inadequate media space allowed. I also had to "adopt a stance", in tune with the prescribed adversarial format.

Also read - Can BJP find its next Narendra Modi in Gujarat?

A few years thereafter, in 2000 AD to be precise, I met Modiji face-to-face (as opposed to "column vs column") in a different context, in another country.

We happened to be staying in Waldorf Astoria, New York. We "bumped" (as they say) into each other.

I reminded him of our adversarial co-existence on The Times of India. "So what?" he said, "You have your views and I, mine. We live in a democratic country."

We had a pleasant conversation, which ended on my side with a vague intuition that the gentleman would go far.

The predominant impression I gathered from this chance meeting, about the man called Modi, is one of deep, below-the-surface intensity fortified with a mythological (not romantic) sense of purpose and of national destiny; like one who is hitched to a chariot that only he, and none else, could see.

I had no idea whatsoever, then, of the size or scope of this epochal chariot. Frankly, even now I don't.

A few years later, in 2005, we became members of the National Integration Council: he, ex officio, as the chief minister of Gujarat and I, in my capacity as a citizen of India.

We greeted each other, as a matter merely of courtesy, if we happened to come face-to-face, which, in the two terms that I was a member, happened only in fits and starts. By then, roles and categories had changed. Modiji was a busy chief minister and the aura about him had thickened forbiddingly. Or, so it seemed. (How does one know?)

Why do I recount these off-the-beat episodes? Surely, not to drop an overcharged name! To me, there are a few insights of some merit that they afford.

The first of these pertains to the discontinuity between the public person and the private persona.

Today I ask myself, "How fair and legitimate is it to judge a person on the basis of what he or she appears to be or advocates in public?"

The flavour of the man I interacted with in the private space of another country was quite different from the colour our exchanges had on the printed page.

The first was genial; the second, adversarial. The challenge in judging a person fairly is to keep the private and the public in juxtaposition.

There is, however, a formidable hurdle in this path. Most of us stand no chance at all of getting to know the human or private aspect of the people we judge.

The impressions we form are necessarily partial, like the image we form of icebergs, nine-tenths of which remain hidden from our view. It is in the nature of all such judgments to become dogmatic and assertive.

The logic is simple. The more partial a view is, the more uncertain we are of ourselves. And the more uncertain we are, the more assertive we become.

All strident assertions in the public space are, as a rule, suspect. Whatever is draped in "sound and fury", as Shakespeare said, "signifies nothing".

The second issue proceeds out of the first. The partialness of the public images and impressions notwithstanding, they (and they alone) are the grist to the mill of public discourses.

Given this, we can afford for ourselves a lot of unwitting humour, if only we can see in perspective the "fireworks" on the screen and the "noise pollution" from the podium.

Also read - Why did bhakts go mum when Modi's mother came to visit him?

These whirling columns of chaotic dust may seem impressive, but they add up to nothing. The only achievement is the unfurling of cyclone of confusion and eventual cynicism.

The third issue is basic. To what extent is anyone free to bring the goodness of his being - his native strength, personal ideals and values - into the public domain?

The Modi I met face-to-face has to play a vastly different role today. The contours of that role may not coincide with the outlines of his humanity.

This is not an issue exclusive to Modi. It is a challenge that everyone who assumes a public role has to face.

A whole forest of stereotypes grow around the individual. Goodness, for example, is assumed to be counter-productive in the public sphere. It is presumed to be token weakness. "It is dangerous to be good," as GB Shaw said, responding to the news of the Mahatma's assassination.

One must uphold the "gravity of the office" and "it can be done only in this way". These are the stereotypes.

Is it as though the cloth is not to be cut to the size of the person, but the person is to be inflated or deflated to fit the coat?

Can there be a bridge, in public life, between the Modi, who is so very human in his love and respect for his mother, and the Modi, who is currently the prime minister of India?

I have it from the authority of none other than Sonia Gandhi herself what a deeply affectionate mother-in-law and doting grandmother Indira Gandhi was.

Sonia's face would reflect respect and wonder each time she referred to her mother-in-law.

And I used to wonder, as someone who detested the Emergency as an assault not only on democracy but on humanity itself, how this connected with the person who was called, albeit admiringly, "the only man in the Indian National Congress", or, the "Iron Lady" of Indian politics.

My overriding concern in sketching, albeit timidly and tentatively, these experiences is to put in some perspective the distaste and disharmony that overshadows the public sphere at the present time.

Traced to its roots, one cannot help concluding that the source of this epidemic of confusion and conflict is the clash of masks that individuals and parties wear.

This "clash of masks" is as contrived, dangerous and unnecessary as "the clash of civilisations".

It is a pity that almost everyone seems to be unaware of their masked identities. This poses the peril of the mask becoming and being the person. In the terminology of being human, this is "death".

Decades ago, Matthew Arnold wrote:

"We are here as on a darkling plain,

Where ignorant armies clash by night."

How we wish that the night would end and we'd live to see the light of a new day.