Upendra Yadav, Narendra Modi’s old aide & his favourite office boy

NEW DELHI: When Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited the BJP headquarters to felicitate the party’s foot soldiers who had worked tirelessly for his campaign, he received a warm welcome from Upendra Yadav, his favourite office boy during his numerous stays at the party office over the years as a worker and later as general secretary.

"He looked at me and said, ‘Yadav, Tu toh hamara purana aadmi hai (you are our old worker).’ He spoke to me for full five minutes, asked me about my kids. I could see that he was as happy as I was," says an ecstatic Yadav, recounting his meeting with the new prime minister on Sunday. Yadav, 38, says he remembers every detail of his long association with Modi that spans over a quarter century.

"He would live in a little room at the office extension where ( finance minister Arun) Jaitleyji works now. He would never complain about the lack of facilities or small rooms, but would insist on having a TV because he liked watching all news bulletins," Yadav says. "He would eat only khichadi at night and I would make sure that was made in the kitchen."

Modi had a repository of CDs and DVDs of patriotic films and songs, says Yadav, who was a teenager then. "Often he would give me a CD of Advani’s rath yatra and ask me to watch it," Yadav says. In return, Yadav had a handful to do. As office boy, he was the go-to person for Modi, who often had very specific demands, Yadav remembers.