He is now a shadow of his former self. Tough to imagine that the booming voice that brought spinning in the machines across Mumbai to a standstill, can now hardly his own echo. Silence, not socialism, now surrounds India’s foremost socialist leader George Fernandes. An illustrious-but-embittered political career — the ghosts of Tehelka and Coffingate — is what this former Defence Minister has now pushed to the back of his mind. Memory is a pause.

As the firebrand leader turned 80 on Thursday, one couldn’t help go back in time recalling the famous image of Fernandes flanked by the Army officials at Siachen.

A different life!

Circa 2010.

The same trade unionist, who at one point was the most shrill anti-imperialist voices, is now caught in a warp as the two women of his life — his political confidante Jaya Jaitly and his estranged wife Leila Kabir — court external legal intervention to own bits of his (living) memory.

Even as the two women who have been his closest partners — in politics and otherwise — fight between themselves, it’s nothingness for the leader himself.

Life!