Mahendra Singh Tikait was a son of the soil, and the intensity with which he lived this identity is difficult for everyone to understand. The Jats?the community to which he belonged?are concentrated in eastern Haryana and western Uttar Pradesh, but they are also spread across a great geographical spread that goes all the way to the borders of western Rajasthan?not only Bikaner, Jodhpur and Jaisalmer but also Chittorgarh. By the time I was spending time in villages, they were graduating from bicycles to motorcycles and went on to jeeps. But at heart, they remained what they were ?sons of the soil. There are variations around the archetype but Tikait was at the centre of that mould. Its strength is derived from strong beliefs, which came from existential reality and has a honesty that others who did not have it could never puncture.
The belief that being a kisan is a way of life based in agriculture, family and community is very deeply ingrained. And it is a source of great strength in this country in spite of often being associated with fundamentalism. What we don?t always appreciate is how this community will fight for its principles. The flip side of being a kisan?with a particular way of life, associated with owning the soil and the land, the water and the crops?is a distrust of trade and the bania. In the mid-eighties, the Marathas, who are like that, organised a big meeting at Kopargaon to tell me that justice had to be done to them in the matter of sugar prices. They came there in the thousands, in tractors and bullock carts. Rajiv Gandhi had just become the Prime Minister and was away in Washington. Sensing the mood, I called up my friends accompanying him to permit me to announce a concession to the farmers on his behalf. I announced the concession but their leader said something that I have never forgotten. He said he was happy that Rajivji had agreed to their demand while being away in Washington. ?But Dr Alagh, tell him that a Maratha is one jo mar jayega par hatega nahin.? A Maratha is one who will die but not give way. The Jats are like that too, and Tikait was their leader after Chaudhary Charan Singh. If they produce with the sweat of their brow, the State has to be fair to them or face the consequences. The Patils and other Maharathas, and the Patels in Gujarat took to cooperatives like fish to water, accepting the lessons of DR Gadgil and Verghese Kurien. But the Jats were much too individualistic for this.
It wasn?t that there were no Jat reformers. There were Sir Chotu Ram, Jakhar Saheb, Ram Niwasji Mirdha and Chaudhary Kumbha Ram Arya. I would also add educationists like Professor Ved Prakash, who was acting chairman of the UGC when I met him last. There have been movements for reform in the community, like in the matter of education. Some daring souls have also talked of the emancipation of women. Chaudhary Charan Singh had thought deeply about India?s agrarian problems and would always welcome economists like me to test his ideas.
But it is fair to say that Tikait was not a part of that larger process, although I am sure he was as proud as anybody else of the University in Hisar and the Suraj Mal Foundation in Delhi, where I was asked to deliver the first Ram Niwas Mirdha oration recently. Tikait, however, had the virtue of conviction in his culture and his Chappan Panchayats. A deep-rooted secular tradition is part of this culture and it is deeply ingrained in the Jats, with some of them not being quite clear about whether they are Hindus or Mussalmans. The standards of fairness within their fold is a very endearing quality of the Chaudharis. Of course, the Khaps have much to answer for. After my first long visit to Haryana as Agricultural Prices Commission chairman, my minister Rao Birender Singh?who was from Haryana?called me. After we had discussed agriculture, he asked, ?Doctor Saheb what else?? I told him, ?Sir, this is the second richest state in India and it has the second lowest survival rate of women in India. Elders like you have a great responsibility.? He sighed and said, ?If there is something practical I can do, tell me.?
I never interacted with Tikait personally, but there was in his language and demeanor a quality of directness and humility that I have admired. The charpai, the hookah and the fresh food were all part of a lifestyle he wasn?t going to give up. The Jat will always welcome you. The Chaudharis are royal hosts and Tikait was one of them.
India gets its strength from women and men who don?t give up beliefs that are rooted in their soils, unless they see the counterfactual in their own experience. We must build this country around our land, our soils, our rivers and our weather for, as the late Rajiv Gandhi once told me, ultimately these will be the basis of an honest culture and polity. I never agreed with all of Mahendra Singh Tikait?s views. But when an honest, rooted, upright and idealistic Indian dies, a little bit dies in each one of us. I mourn him.
The author is a former Union minister