My tender feelings towards Narendra Modi stem from the circumstance that he was born the same year as my deceased younger brother whom I loved inordinately. Where Vinod did yeoman’s service for equity and imagination in school education, Modi has the distinction of having put the divine vision of Hindutva on the national agenda.By lending his secular office to perform the consecration of the new Ram Temple at Ayodhya, he can claim credit for aligning the state with the Hindu religion.But, soon, as he attains to the watershed Vedic mark of 75 years of age two months from now, a dilemma will confront our world-historical prime minister.The Vedas, from whence we are instructed, Hindutva derives, designate 75 as the marker for the jeev atma (the fleshly human) to turn towards the forest in order to renounce this world and begin the quest for moksha (salvation).This third stage of a stipulated 100-year life-span is what the Vedas call Vanaprastha Ashram.For this reason it is that the party of the Sanatan which is inseparable from Vedic injunctions decided some years back that its workers/leaders are to retire from political activism at the age of 75.But here is Narendra Modi’s dilemma: does he comply with party policy and Vedic requirement, call quits on formalising India as a Hindu Rashtra while the secularists remain strong still, even garnering international empathy, or does he defy Vedic injunctions and party discipline, and stick to his worldly project of finishing the political job of making Bharat great again via her make-over into a theocracy?This is no easy conundrum either. There is no guarantee that the likes of an Amit Shah or Adityanath, however feisty, will be able to sustain the same undivided allegiance of the right-wing base and the loyalty of the corporates, or that they will not sooner than later engage more in showing each other down than in furthering the Hindtva project;Also, if Sanatan teaching requires both things, a Hindu Rashtra and renunciation at 75, how may Shri Modi reconcile this negative dialectic?To note, Modi as prime minister has no precedents to draw upon either.No antecedent numero uno was a votary of Hindu Rashtra, not even Atal Bihari Vajpayee, even if all but one may have been seekers of salvation. Those that wish to see India great again by being returned to her ancient glory married to digital effulgence will no doubt want Modi to carry on till 2047, the centenary year which he has designated as the year of Bharat’s full-blown viksit-ta (i.e. development).Shri Modi will then be still three years short of the stipulated life-span of a hundred years, and wouldn’t that be unprecedentedly lovely?Altogether, when colossi walk the earth, their burdens tend to be colossal as well.For a thought: given the eclectic genius of the Hindu “way of life”, we may hope that from the highest pulpits of the faith can emerge a new, creative interpretation of the Vedas heretofore concealed from one and all – such as might allow Yug Purush, Narendra Modi to postpone his designated pursuit of moksha till such time as all the sinful secular demons have been demolished and all the sissy socialists sent to live out their days in remote enclaves of decrepit finality.Fingers crossed in hope and trembling.Badri Raina taught at Delhi University.