Vigil at 27 Safdarjang Road

new delhi: a stone's throw away from the safdarjang tomb, there was a vigil on at madhavrao scindia's home sunday evening. they expected his body to be brought home late during the night. related links only a few hours back, madhavrao scindia had left 27 safdarjang road for the ill-fated trip to attend a public meeting in kanpur. it was meant to be part of a series of parivartan (change) rallies, through which the congress planned to get into the election mode in uttar pradesh.inside the compound of scindia's government bungalow, the cars of at least two reporters -- sanjiv sinha of the indian express and anju sharma of the hindustan times -- remained parked till late in the day. they were regulars on the congress beat, and among the four journalists who died when scindia's plane crashed into a water logged field at motta in mainpuri district. leaders from across the political spectrum walked into the scindia home to pay their respects. prime minister atal behari vajpayee -- who lost one lok sabha election to scindia from gwalior -- was among them. leader of the opposition sonia gandhi and daughter priyanka were among the early arrivals, and were there till late evening. samajwadi party leader amar singh called him a man who blended modernity with traditional values. human resource development minister said he was an able administrator. one visitor described the mood inside the home as sombre; the grief there was subdued. she attributed it to the way the 'royals' handled personal loss. priyanka was seen handling the vip visitors inside. for sonia, a comparative green horn in politics, scindia was her right-hand man in the lok sabha. as leader of the opposition, her interventions in the lok sabha proceedings were the few, carefully scripted ones. scindia, as the deputy leader, tried to compensate for that. though 56, scindia was seen a 'youthful' leader - just like rajesh pilot, who too died in an accident, only a year back. paradoxically, he was also among the party's senior leaders, occupying the important rung after sonia. but he was too much of a congressman to assert his seniority. when there was a mini-revolt in the party over sonia's italian origins, scindia proclaimed his loyalty to her. law minister arun jaitly was expected to travel to agra from where an air force plane would bring the bodies to delhi. from motta to agra, they would travel by road.