Exiting With Grace: The Delicate Art Of Leaving The Public Life

The once-legendary Mahendra Singh Dhoni has dragged the Chennai Super Kings (CSK) to the bottom of the IPL points-table this season. Many cricket connoisseurs believe Dhoni should have withdrawn his shadow from the CSK long ago. On the other hand, Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma have bowed out on a high note, paving the way for a welcome new beginning in Indian cricket: India has a new captain, the elegant Shubman Gill, now the designated helmsman who would have the burden of satisfying and catering to the emotions and anxieties of a billion Indians in this cricket-crazy land. After all, this is the only arena of endeavour in which we seem to be capable of winning the honours cleanly and honourably.

The unforced departure of Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma, the two pillars of Indian cricket for the last decade, has reminded us of the necessity바카라�and importance바카라�in our collective life of that elusive virtue바카라�the subtle and essentially sublime art of leaving the arena gracefully.

Leaving the arena, especially the public arena, is not an easy call to make. It is, at the end of the day, a personal decision for a political leader but in every case, a host of individual calculations and vested interests do intrude in deciding whether to hang up the boots. There is always the allure of one more fight in the ring; the temptation to get one more (hopefully the final) chance to achieve this or that milestone; or, simply, the delusion that if one left the ramparts the barbarians would force their way in. The delicious dish of indispensability is served to the 바카라�leader바카라� every morning and evening by courtiers.

We can talk, for example, of former President Joe Biden of the United States. Despite all the signs of a fading president, the family, staffers, and hangers-on would not allow Old Joe to call it a day when he was in office. All the power and the patronage of the White House was used; first to hide the seriousness of the president바카라�s creeping ill-health, and, then, to bulldoze the Democratic Party into nominating him for a second term in 2024; and when the shit hit the fan in the first presidential debate with Donald Trump, there was a scramble to re-arrange the Democratic national ticket. It is anybody바카라�s guess whether Kamala Harris would have won the Democratic presidential primary sweepstakes, and whether a different candidate would have emerged with the potential to stop Trump from storming back to the White House.

And, not to forget, Trump바카라�s own graceless refusal to leave the office after the 2020 elections, despite a very clear vote against him and in favour of Joe Biden. Mercifully, Trump did pack his suitcases but not before allowing his supporters to stage that ugly and repulsive 바카라�coup바카라� of January 6, 2021.

In non-democratic settings, the very thought of the leader 바카라�leaving바카라� is fraught with unpredictable, often violent, consequences. The habits and traditions of a peaceful transfer of power have eluded most governing arrangements around the world.

Charles de Gaulle is one of the few examples in post-World War II history of a leader who walked away from the job. A war-time hero, he had the charisma to elevate himself as the saviour of French honour and prestige and he made French politics adjust itself to his personality. He was the emperor of all he surveyed in the French political landscape. De Gaulle provided stability and restored a sense of purpose but then failed to appreciate that his leadership itself had ushered in forces of modernisation and cultural transformation in its wake.

Increasingly, he became a victim of the heady cocktail of indispensability and self-belief in his incorruptibility, omnipotence and invincibility. And when French voters did not endorse his proposals for reforms in a referendum in April 1969, he took the rebuff as a vote of no-confidence in his leadership. He walked away. (Forty-seven years later, a less dramatic leader, David Cameron, chose to leave 10 Downing Street when the British electorate voted for exiting the European Union).

A supremely self-centered de Gaulle would have it his way or no other way. He told a confidante: 바카라�If the French do not want to listen to me, well, I will go, and afterwards people will see that I was right.바카라� And then he left.

De Gaulle, well, was de Gaulle. But even when there are well-respected rules of the game about change of leadership, the rub remains that the incumbent is unwilling to see the writing on the wall.

Margaret Thatcher, another consequential leader, failed to read the changing winds in her own Conservative Party and therefore had to be made to leave. She was not unaware of growing discontent in the party over her style, dominant and unyielding, but cheerfully persuaded herself that what she was doing or had accomplished was bound to produce some discord and unhappiness바카라�and so be it. She was not prepared to throw in the towel in anger or frustration.

She refused to bow to the eternal reality that all good things come to an end. In her memoir, The Downing Street Years, she herself decodes the reluctance to leave:

바카라�My problem was the lack of a successor whom I could trust both to keep my legacy secure and to build on it.바카라�

This obsession with a 바카라�legacy바카라� becomes a consuming concern in all settings. The leader convinces himself or herself that there was still unfinished 바카라�work바카라� that could only be attended to under her watch.

바카라�Nor, however, did I seriously intend to go 바카라�on and on.바카라� I thought that about two years into the next Parliament would be the right time to leave. Of course, even that would a wrench. I felt as full of energy as ever. But I accepted that one day it would be my duty to leave No 10, whether the electorate had demanded it or not.바카라�

Thatcher had already been prime minister for 11 years, yet, she had not found the verve to leave the arena.

We in India can take considerable satisfaction in the way in which the Indian political system has sorted out the business of transfer of power. Those who lost at the numbers game handed over power and walked away. Even the mighty Indira Gandhi made no fuss about making way for a new set of rulers in 1977. She just left. And, so did every other successor.

Yet, many historians believe that Jawaharlal Nehru should have called it a day after his two elected terms as prime minister. By 1957/58 he had accomplished his most consequential milestones: steered the new country to a critical stability, firmed up the parliamentary system, and set the tone for a secular and equitable social order.

As per the law of history, the forces of modernisation Nehru had unleashed in our stagnant society produced different responses, from the Left and the Right. But by 1957/58 he had lost that magic touch and was unable to tame neither the Right nor the Left. Even his own Congress Party had lost all enthusiasm for his 바카라�work바카라�. There was a palpable dissipation of national purpose, but Nehru could not read the incipient itch for change.

So, he did not leave, and had to live with the ignominy of the Chinese debacle. Perhaps a different leader would have produced a different leadership rhythm and music to handle the vexatious Chinese problem. And history is harsh on him.

Many historians are also of the view that Atal Bihari Vajpayee should have heeded the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh바카라�s advice바카라�though not a demarche바카라�to make way for L.K. Advani in 2003. But who knows how the Bharatiya Janata Party would have re-grouped itself under a different leader and how the national political forces would have realigned themselves! Vajpayee, however, did not leave.

In 2014, a new, dramatic, and very consequential, principle was enunciated: those over 75 years should not aspire for hands-on constitutional slots; instead, we were told, the seniors바카라� experience and wisdom should be available to guide the new regime. A very worthwhile principle, an honourable mantra, bespeaking of a mature political system.

(Views expressed are personal)

Harish Khare is a Delhi-based senior journalist and public commentator

This article is part of Outlook Magazine's June 11, 2025 issue, 'Living on the Edge', which explores India바카라�s fragile borderlands and the human cost of conflict. It appeared in print as 'Art of Leaving.'