Gadgil — Popular parliamentarian and witty orator

He came under attack from his detractors who saw it as apro-Hindutva stance while BJP was quick to embarass Congress by citing Gadgil’s views as being in tandem with its own.

Gadgil, it appeared, had to pay a price for his openness which was not in tune with the thinking among a majority of prominent partymen.

Worried over frequent electoral setback at the Centre, Gadgil wanted Congress to follow Tony Blair who gave a new look to British Labour Party when it was down in the dumps.

However, Gadgil will be remembered long for his role as chief spokesman of the party. He regaled the media with his enormous grasp of Congress history, parliamentary democracy, especially of the Westminster type, international affairs and grassroot polity.

"No decision is also a decision," he once quipped to mediapersons when asked why the Narasimha Rao government delayed decisions. Incidentally this remark became a hallmark of the Rao era.

A loyalist of the Nehru-Gandhi family, Gadgil used to justify with ease the cult of "high command" in the oldest political organisation in the country.

Gadgil’s refrain was when the polity is federal, the organisation should be unitary. In fact, he boasted that high command was in a way a "gift" given by the Congress to Indian democracy.

To buttress his point, he would point out that the BJP which always took potshots at the Congress for its central command structure has now itself started calling its leadership as the "high command".

Before having to deal with the media, he was the Information and Broadcasting minister in the Rajiv Gandhi regime and wrote several books including "Obscenity and Law", "International Law" and "Judicial Administration in India".

Born in September, 1928, at Pune, Gadgil was thrice elected to Lok Sabha in the eighties from his birth place and represented Rajya Sabha an equal number of terms in the seventies and late nineties.

A popular parliamentarian and orator, he got his basics in public speaking from his father N V Gadgil, who was a freedom fighter and later minister in Nehru’s first cabinet.

After a brief stint in the Praja Socialist Party, V N Gadgil joined Congress in 1962 and became General Secretary of the Maharashtra PCC in 1967 and was soon brought to the Rajya Sabha by Indira Gandhi, who liked his oratory.

Having studied at the London School of Economics and later called to the Bar from Lincoln’s Inn, London, he became a Senior Advocate of the Supreme Court of India. He was honorary professor of economics in Ruparel College, Mumbai, and professor of Constitutional Law in New Law College.

Married to Sunita Gadgil in 1955, he has one son and one daughter.