George Fernandes was suffering from Alzheimer's The last rites of former Defence Minister George Fernandes, who died this morning at the age of 88, will be performed on Wednesday once his son returns to the country, said social activist and former Samata Party president Jaya Jaitly. "We are waiting for his son, who lives in the US. His last rites will be performed tomorrow. His body will be embalmed and put at his residence," she told media at George Fernandes' home in New Delhi. Max Hospital in Saket got a call from the Fernandes residence today morning. A team of doctors from the hospital was rushed to his place. However, till the time doctors reached his place, Mr Fernandes was already dead. George Fernandes had been suffering from Alzheimer's disease for a long time and was down with swine flu for the last few days as well. He was the Defence Minister in the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government when the Kargil War broke out between India and Pakistan, and India conducted its nuclear tests at Pokhran. First elected to the Lok Sabha in 1967, George Fernandes served several times as a Union Cabinet Minister, holding very important portfolios such as defence, railways and communications at the centre. From Prime Minister Narendra Modi to Congress chief Rahul Gandhi, leaders from across political parties have paid homage to George Fernandes.<doc-sep>The last rites of Fernandes, who passed away on Tuesday morning at the age of 88, will be performed on Wednesday. (Photo: ANI) New Delhi: The body of former Defence Minister George Fernandes will be cremated while his ashes will be buried, said social activist and former Samata Party president Jaya Jaitly on Tuesday. "He (Fernandes) had earlier expressed his wish to be cremated, but during his last days, he said he wanted to be buried. So, we will cremate the body and bury the ashes, to fulfil both his wishes," Jaitly told media here. The last rites of Fernandes, who passed away on Tuesday morning at the age of 88, will be performed on Wednesday, Jaitly said. "We are waiting for his son, who lives in the US. His last rites will be performed tomorrow. His body will be embalmed and put at his residence," she said. Fernandes had been suffering from Alzheimer's disease for a long time and was down with swine flu for the last few days as well. He was the Defence Minister in the Atal Bihari Vajpayee-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government when the Kargil War broke out between India and Pakistan in 1999, and India conducted its nuclear tests at Pokhran (1998). Besides that, he also held several ministerial portfolios including communications, industry and railways.<doc-sep>Coalitions are tricky. Each constituent looks for extra leverage, and the tensions between the leading party and its allies are always below the surface. Anyone rocking the boat is condemned by all. Post the 1980s, many fell away because George Fernandes gave the fight against injustice greater priority than acquiring power. An example of this was his decision to resign from the Janata government in 1979, despite having personally suffered the excesses of the Emergency. Essentially, the Janata government of 1977 was a coalition government in which parties had technically submerged their identities for what turned out to be a very short period. He had then defended the government powerfully in Parliament in 1979 upon the request of Prime Minister Morarji Desai. Overnight, he changed his stance, shocking and deeply disappointing his socialist colleagues and the rest of the country. During the night, having tried his utmost to persuade the Left parties headed by Jyoti Basu, and other senior colleagues in government, not to contribute to the imminent collapse of the government, he was subjected to a long political and finally emotional argument by Madhu Limaye. Limaye failed to convince George Fernandes with his ideological arguments to resign on the issue of the Jan Sangh’s dual membership in the RSS. Finally, he lobbed him a big sentimental ball: “Do all our years of friendship mean nothing to you?” he asked. At that point George Fernandes stood up and said, “Madhu, if it all comes down to just that, I will submit my resignation tomorrow morning.” And that is what happened. George Fernandes’s action had many unpleasant repercussions. The ones that dogged him as an individual lasted almost a decade. He was well aware of the negative impact his political reputation suffered because of his old comrade-in-arms Madhu Limaye; however, although he visited the latter less often after that, he never said anything to blame him. George Fernandes fought his way out of an almost isolated political existence by leading the battle against the Rajiv Gandhi government’s reported corruption in the Bofors and HDW submarine deals. He constantly hurtled through the length and breadth of the country for trade union gatherings. During this time, he also played midwife in the delivery of VP Singh as an alternative “clean” leader. It was during this entire period that I believe he decided that he would never again be responsible for the fall of a government which he helped create and thus became a disciplined soldier in other coalition periods. In late 1989, as the National Front government set itself up, the walls of power came up alongside. VP Singh, with his typical caginess, kept even his closest colleagues on tenterhooks, informing them that they would become ministers only half an hour before they were expected to be sworn in. Some eager ones were said to have already got their bandhgala suits, ones with tight necks, stitched in anticipation. Everyone seemed to be waiting anxiously for an advance indication from the prime minister, but that did not happen. George Sahib nonchalantly went upstairs for an afternoon nap and had no time to change into a fresh kurta when he was woken up and told to reach Rashtrapati Bhavan in twenty minutes. His colleagues and I sat in the office downstairs in his tiny apartment at Hauz Khas, amazed at the lack of dignity in the way this was done. Everyone felt ridiculous. A day or so after the swearing in of the council of ministers, the portfolios were announced. George Fernandes was astounded that he had been allocated the Ministry of Railways. He said he had led the biggest railway strike in Asia and headed railway unions. How could he be sitting across them at the table now? For three days he refused to go to Rail Bhavan to attend office. Finally, VP Singh assured him he would change his portfolio after three months. That never happened. George Fernandes went to office in his old diesel Premier Padmini car driven by his Mumbai colleague Freddie D’Sa. The guard at the Ministry’s entrance wouldn’t let him in and told him to get an entrance slip made at the reception first. He hadn’t recognised the new boss who had arrived with no prior information or pomp and splendour. ~~~ In 1998, the NDA government chose George Fernandes as the convener of the alliance. He had helped draft the Common Agenda for Governance and was considered by the BJP to have given it the legitimacy required to reassure all the dithering “are we secular/are we not?” allies to come on board to give it a clear majority. This alienated many of his socialist colleagues like Madhu Dandavate and Surendra Mohan but even they were divided between the younger and more ambitious ones who stayed because they wanted to pursue an active political life and felt George Fernandes was the best bet to help them achieve it in alliance with the BJP. He always felt happier being among colleagues with a fighting spirit who had a strong nose for electoral politics. Thus he ignored those who were alienated unless they too came occasionally to ask for small personal favours like school and hospital admissions, which he happily facilitated. As mentioned earlier, party workers and even coalition partners constantly asked for favours, from cash to free travel passes to positions on committees that would give their acolytes some clout; there were requests for even getting children who had failed their examinations to be cleared and accepted at interviews. He was always angered or saddened by this, wondering where the fervour to serve without asking for anything in return was disappearing. Most such people nursed grouses against him thereafter, grumbling that if other parties and politicians helped their people, why he could not. It was just not his style to distribute patronage and largesse, since he had never demanded such things for himself. A lot of the time antagonisms built up against me because of my role as messenger of negative news to these favour-seekers but it did not seem to bother George Sahib in the least that I was the “fall guy”. I grumbled, but did it anyway. The role as convener of the NDA was sometimes a disappointment for George Fernandes. He thought that there should be a proper mechanism for consultation and coordination between allies so that any political or policy matters could be smoothened out before being made to look like ideological disagreements which were strictly to be kept out of the common agenda. When in the first year of the NDA, something like the singing of “Vande Mataram” in schools in Uttar Pradesh came up, the media chased different coalition partners for their comments, hoping disparate responses would emerge to show dissonance among them. Some nudging must have come from the Congress behind the scenes since the media loved to create headlines like “Mamata and Samata cause headaches for the BJP” or words to that effect. I didn’t hear any defence on the “Vande Mataram” issue coming from the BJP. Thus when the media rushed to me expecting a negative reaction, I stated what George Fernandes had said to me earlier in the day: “It has been sung in Parliament for quite some time and the practice was introduced by a Congressman. Hindus and Muslims have sung it together during the freedom movement so why should it be considered objectionable now?” But this was all very ad hoc and uncoordinated. Now that the BJP has a majority in Parliament, playing one off the other doesn’t get anyone anywhere. Excerpted with permission from Life Among The Scorpions, Jaya Jaitly, Rupa Publications.<doc-sep>
Bengaluru: After four decades in politics, George Fernandes slowly faded away from public memory after 2010, debilitated by Parkinson's and Alzheimer. Fernandes had to vacate his house on Krishna Menon Marg in Lutyen’s Delhi. That bungalow was a landmark in the national capital and its gates were always open as he hated security and was persuaded to have some only after the December 13, 2001, Parliament attack. Earlier, he used to walk from his house to Parliament at least once a week. George Fernandes’ wife Leila Kabir Fernandes had returned to his life. Over the next few years, Leila and son Sean were engaged in a protracted battle with Jaya Jaitly, Fernandes’ close aide, friend and colleague. Fernandes’ brothers Michael, Richard and Alexander were accused of attempting to usurp the socialist leader’s property and legacy. Sadly, the firebrand leader who had once challenged even the mighty Indira Gandhi was not in a position to know or understand what was happening around him in his own house. The disease had reached an advanced stage. Some of his old associates and friends had even issued a public statement claiming that the former defence minister was missing. Leila and Sean later shifted Fernandes to their own house in Delhi's Panchsheel Park for intensive medical care. Speaking to this reporter, Leila and Sean had alleged that Fernandes’ brothers had colluded with Jaya to grab his property and political legacy. In this battle, Anil Hegde, Frenandes's old aide, was with Leila and Sean. Jaya Jaitly and Fernandes’ trade union leader brother Michael were not ready to budge. They had approached the Delhi High Court seeking access to the former defence minister. The HC intervened and they were allowed to visit him at his house in Panchsheel Park on his birthday. Fernandes was reportedly staring at all the people and could not remember anything. Michael spoke to him in Konkani, their mother tongue, and Kannada, the language of their home state. Fernandes’ eyes lit up for a moment after hearing the words in Konkani and Kannada. The family doctor who was also present told the visitors that he had forgotten English, Hindi and Marathi, in which he was fluent, because of Alzheimer’s. The atmosphere was grim and Leila politely requested all to leave. The battle for George Fernandes' legacy continued for a few more years, but faded from the media glare with time. Not many even in his neighbourhood knew that a towering leader was living among them. The visitors were few and the family expected the others to respect their privacy. George Fernandes, a Mangalorean Roman Catholic, had fled to Mumbai in late 1950s. His journey was ticketless from Kadur in Chickmagalur district to Mumbai (then known as Bombay). His father, John Joseph Fernandes, wanted the eldest son, fondly known as ‘Gerry’, to be a priest. But a free thinking George hated the seminary and ran away. His father was heartbroken and did not allow him to return home. His doting mother, Alice Martha Fernandes, tried to protect her son from an angry father, but she had to give up after sometime. A teenaged George spent nights on roadside benches and ate at Udupi hotels for free. There, he started organising exploited hotel employees. The owners were angry and George decided to go to Mumbai. In Mumbai, life was initially tough for him. He spoke only Konkani, Kannada and English, and had no knowledge of Hindi or Marathi. He had no money or place to stay. He used to frequent Udupi hotels run by fellow Mangaloreans. They fed and sheltered him. Ranjith Shetty, who runs iconic Udupi restaurant, Hotel Raja, at Girgaum in south Mumbai, fondly remembers George Fernandes of the 1960s. “My father opened this restaurant in 1943. When I was a child, George Fernandes used to come here regularly. He used to talk to us in Tulu and sometimes in Kannada with my father. He was such a rage in Mumbai. Almost revered by the poor mill workers. I could feel that,” Shetty told News18. Fernandes came in contact with Mumbai’s legendary trade union leader D’Mello and started organising textile mill workers in the maximum city. In the 1967 Lok Sabha elections, Fernandes defeated the mighty SK Patil from South Bombay, creating history. After his heroic fight during the Emergency years, he became a household name across India and shifted his political base to Bihar.