Narendra Modi touches feet of Bharatiya Jana Sangh veteran leader Makhanlal Sarkar
Telegraph | 10 May 2026
Nearly a month after celebrating his 98th birthday on April 16, veteran BJP leader Makhanlal Sarkar on Saturday witnessed what his family described as the “crowning moment” of a political journey that had begun more than seven decades ago.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi felicitated the nonagenarian leader before a large gathering on the historic Brigade Parade Ground in Calcutta, where Suvendu Adhikari was sworn in as the chief minister of Bengal. It was the symbolic recognition of a lifetime devoted to the BJP's growth in eastern India.
Modi embraced Sarkar and touched his feet, a gesture that the family feels is not merely a felicitation but an acknowledgement of decades of silent organisational work carried out far from the spotlight.
For Sarkar, however, the moment represented far more than a ceremonial honour. It marked the completion of a political and ideological journey that traces back to the formative years of the Bharatiya Jana Sangh — the previous form of the BJP — under the leadership of Syama Prasad Mookerjee.
Sunny, his youngest son, said the veteran leader’s association with nationalist politics began during one of the most turbulent chapters in post-Independence India.
In 1952, when Sarkar was still a teenager, he accompanied Mookerjee during his historic movement in Kashmir opposing the permit system and advocating complete integration of Jammu and Kashmir with India.
“My father was then below 18 years of age. In those days, there was no juvenile correctional system. Even then, he was arrested along with Syama Prasad Mookerjee for attempting to hoist the Indian national flag in Kashmir,” Sunny said over the phone from Calcutta, where he had accompanied his father from Siliguri to attend the oath-taking programme.
Sunny said the young activist was kept under house arrest for 39 days at the residence of Ramnath Dogra, a local Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) leader. Authorities had imposed strict conditions, including mandatory weekly appearances at a nearby police station.
That early experience, the family says, shaped Sarkar’s lifelong commitment to the nationalist movement. He later became actively associated with the RSS and dedicated himself to organisational work across north Bengal.
In 1980, the year the BJP was formally established, Sarkar was entrusted with organisational responsibilities in the districts of Darjeeling, Jalpaiguri, and the then-undivided West Dinajpur.
Working at a time when the BJP had little political presence in Bengal, he played a key role in building the party’s grassroots network across the region.
“During his tenure, my father enrolled nearly 10,000 BJP members in a single day,” the son said. “A year later, he was appointed president of the Darjeeling district unit of the BJP.”
Acting on the instructions of then Prime Minister and senior BJP stalwart Atal Bihari Vajpayee, he continued as Darjeeling district president until 1988.
“He devoted his entire life to party-building activities, sustaining himself through small business ventures while remaining committed to grassroots mobilisation,” said Putul, his wife.
The veteran leader stays at Suryanagar in ward 23 of Siliguri with his wife and two sons. All four of his daughters are married.
“Even at the age of 98, he continues to maintain an active daily routine independently,” the wife added.