It’s late afternoon, and I sit here typing away at my keyboard after having attended a marathon marketing session on how successful brands differentiate themselves. In another hour, I will have the opportunity to listen to an individual who has done just that. Dr. Shashi Tharoor, I have been told, is on his way to the IIM Calcutta campus, and having keenly followed the vicissitudes of his political career in India, I am looking forward to hearing his lecture.

With a more than stellar academic record, his skills as a change-leader with the UN, his brazen commentary on politics and policy, and his uncharacteristic flair – Dr. Tharoor has, in the past few years, become a role model for many. Today he would be talking about his idea of an ‘Indian’ and the dynamics of politics in diversity. Having studied in institutes which were veritable melting pots of the diverse populace of our motherland, I have often pondered over the interplay of these differences. I hope to get a rich, and more informed perspective today. And with this, I must head to the auditorium.

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With some difficulty, I manage to grab a well-positioned seat in a jam-packed auditorium. Enter Dr. Tharoor, a picture of poise clad in a kurta and coat, followed closely by his wife. The thunderous applause is quickly followed by the Director’s welcome address. Dr. Tharoor now walks to the dais, smiles at the eager audience, and with a casual flick of hair begins his speech.

 It’s a cold evening in Kolkata, and as I ponder over Dr. Tharoor’s words over chai, it is his powerful delivery and impeccable diction I am reminded of first. His clarity of thought, peppered with witty anecdotes, subtle and some not-so-subtle jibes at his party folks, all embellished with words of wisdom picked up from the choicest of writers and leaders, made sure he was able to drive his point home.

“Any truism about India can be contradicted with another truism about India”, he had remarked. He unabashedly decried the use of caste politics. He also cited incidents from his childhood when he had heard the mellifluous mingling of chants of four different places of worship in his neighbourhood. This, he mentioned, is what India stood for.

According to him, Indian nationalism, as a concept, has stood the test of time in practice, inspite of it seeming to be a flawed idea in theory, given the multifarious identities constituting the billion-strong populace. He coupled his examples of Muslim presidents, chiefs of defence from minorities with a remark on how his Kashmiri wife had chosen to marry him, a Keralite. One of his analogies that I distinctly remember is how unlike the rest of the secular world, India is not a cultural melting pot, but more like a ‘thali’ where an assortment is laid out without being forced to lose their individual identities.

Dr. Tharoor’s speech is one of the most riveting pieces of oratory I have heard of late, and having been audience to the likes of Mr. Sitaram Yechuri, Ms. Kiran Bedi and His Holiness The Dalai Lama as part of IIM Calcutta’s Institute Lecture Series in the past few months, that is saying something!