Prez plans music-n-maths

CHENNAI: Will APJ Abdul Kalam serve a second term as President? If his interactions with family and friends are any indication, no.

While public petitions are hoping to extend Kalam’s stay at Rashtrapathi Bhavan, the President is longing to get back to his twin passions of teaching and music.

“He (Kalam) is not interested (in a second term). And I will not tell him anything that will put him in a dilemma,” says Mohammed Maraikayar, Kalam’s elder brother, from his home in Rameswaram in Tamil Nadu.

Adds Maraikayar’s daughter Naseema, “When he came home last year, Chittappa (uncle, in Tamil) told me that he wanted to resume teaching. He always had a teacher’s tone when he conversed with us, children.”

The one thing Kalam, 76, will unfailingly carry back from Rashtrapathi Bhavan is his veena. “Chittappa is happy that now he will have more time to play it,” says Naseema.
Nobody suspects Kalam is interested in politics. Naseema recounts an incident, “Recently, when M Karunanidhi presented him a yellow shawl, I asked Chittappa if he was entering politics. “Anything but politics,” he said.

Kalam recently told students of Madras Institute of Technology, his alma mater, “I will return here in three months to deliver lectures on nanotechnology to undergraduates.” Anna University vice chancellor D Viswanathan adds, “The President expressed his desire to teach and I suggested nanotechnology. He readily agreed.”

The university has spruced up a bungalow at a cost of Rs 25 lakh for Kalam. “His old room is still vacant. But, owing to security reasons, we have readied a new bungalow,” the vice-chancellor adds. Kalam, meanwhile, has not yet spelled out his preference of stay.