Source on K. R. Narayanan

“Logic - was a tool in his intellectual armoury but it was not a cold, calculating logic. There was space in it for something beyond the algebraic piling of reason upon reason.”

“His term at the London School of Economics (LSE) is deservedly celebrated for the equation he enjoyed with the cerebral but morally intense Harold Laski. Less known is the fact that his studentship at LSE included attending lectures by Karl Popper, Professor of Logic and Scientific Method. He related to me this classroom story: Popper was once discussing the value in an `open' society of checks and balances and (as Popper put it) of one `sphere' arriving at an equilibrium with another `sphere' without direct state intervention. And to give his argument a visual correlative, Popper pointed to an empty chair and said, "If you let that chair be, you will be able to sit in it at some point." He, who was 26 or 27 then, broke in and said to Popper, "Letting the chair be is all right, but if you or someone were to pick up the chair and hit it on my head, I think I would be entitled to catch it and throw it out of the window." He [KRN] said that to his embarrassment this intervention was greeted with a small applause from others in the class.”

“Both his teachers at LSE, from opposite ends of the ideological spectrum, exercised a lasting if unflaunted influence on their precocious student. In matters pertaining to national politics they doubtless had something to do with his oft-repeated caution against forms of political `stability' which, in his words, "could slip into authoritarian exercise of power".”

“He was wise when others would have been smart, frank when others would have been cautious. He was available to the people of India, as a "working President" (the description he gave to himself in an interview) but he was essentially his own friend, counsellor and confidant - with, of course, Usha Narayanan by his side. His inner resources were phenomenal - for reading, contemplating and, in his own special manner, brooding. But when seized of a problem - large or small, in the public domain or very personal - He would go into a shell of thought where no one may enter. He was never secretive, but always in need of a space of his own. No one could think for him, much less find the words he needed. He did not seek publicity for his views though he was (to use his own word) amazed how the Indian media seemed to fix its priorities. He was as conservative in his working style as he was radical in his thinking, pen to paper being his writing practice rather than computer keyboarding.”