It takes a lot of courage to stretch your hand across the border to a neighbour, which supports terrorists who have killed, maimed, orphaned and ridiculed thousands in your land.

It takes an unbelievable political strength to ride a bus into a country that for decades has spewed venom on you, itched you into four wars, and keeps poaching on your most beautiful Valley that is also the heart of your secularism.

You would be called a political naïve if you invite the man, who plotted Kargil intrusion that claimed the lives of more than 500 of your bravest soldiers, to talk peace.

Atal Behari Vajpayee did this and much, much more. He is a statesman who rose above the venomous hatred that his party preached, who stepped on the sharp political divisions of India, closing his eyes to his own political future, to try and find peace.

To find peace and development for one-fifth of world’s population that is among the most impoverished, more than half of whom are illiterates.

<B>Unbelievable moral commitment</B>

Vajpayee dreamt of peace, even as he deftly handled internal compulsions, swept aside right wing reservations, and straddled the subcontinent like a colossus.

It is not so difficult to be a missionary preaching peace and healing the sick. It is much easier to be a peace-preaching track II activist with no political future and social responsibilities. It is much, much easier to be a retired General talking peace over an evening drink after a lifetime of wars.

But it takes enormous political courage, unbelievable moral commitment and above all an unflinching love for humanity to fight for peace in South Asia today.

Atal Behari Vajpayee did just that, though he may not have been successful given necessities of democracy and Pakistan. For generations of tormented, humiliated, terrorized Kashmiris, Vajpayee was a lamb that walked into them as jackals of hatred watched in trepidation on the sidelines.

For efforts which redefined Indo-Pak diplomacy and lit the lamp of hope under the South Asian nuclear umbrella Atal Behari Vajpayee deserves the Nobel Peace Prize.

For offering the “hand of friendship” to the nation that you know hijacked your airline on the eve of the millennium, that send raiders to your Parliament to wipe out the political leadership, Vajpayee deserves the Nobel Prize. In fact, in the chaotic world of revengeful leaders and warring ideologies no one deserves it better.

<B>Source: Times of India</B>