New Delhi: Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s name was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in 2004 for his refusal to up the ante along with Pakistan president Pervez Musharraf who almost threatened to use nuclear weapons against India. The nomination by New Delhi-based International Awakening Centre was perhaps the greatest honour for a democratic country’s leader because it was in recognition of Vajpayee’s solid stand against terrorism over two decades.
Vajpayee’s attempts to end skirmishes between India and Pakistan, both nuclear powers, had earned him many laurels. His bus ride to Lahore amid cross-border infiltration and tensions in Kashmir seemed like a thaw in the relations between India and Pakistan.
He followed up the mission with a bilateral summit in Agra, which ended in a fiasco.
The IAC had nominated US President George Bush, British Prime Minister Tony Blair and Musharraf along with Vajpayee.