GIRI, THE MAN
K.
P. S. MENON
To
judge simply by bio-data, few Indians of this century have had a more crowded,
varied and distinguished record than Dr. V. V. Giri.
He was a labour leader, legislator, Minister of the
State Government, Minister of the Central Government, High Commissioner of
India in
A
recital of the posts which Dr. Giri held, however,
will not do him justice. The man was greater than his record. None of the posts
which he held could contain him.
In
this article I shall make no attempt to appraise Dr. Giri’s
achievements, but merely try and bring out the quality of the man.
Perhaps,
Dr. Giri’s predominant trait was his sterling independence,
which showed itself even when he was in his teens. As a student in
This
incident showed another quality which Giri possessed
in abundance, his sheer zest for life. Even after he retired as President, he
continued to take an active interest in politics, though he took care to keep
aloof from politicking which was the order of the day. At the same time, he organised a city-cleaning campaign in
Khan
Abdul Ghaffar Khan, the Frontier Gandhi, once said:
“The bane with you, Indians, is politicking.” Not politics, but politicking,
that is playing politics, not for the sake of one’s country, but one’s
community, one’s caste, one’s sect, or one’s petty self. Giri
felt that none of the existing parties was above politicking. Almost in the
last year of his life he attempted to found a new party called Labour Party. To
have imagined, however, that at a time when all parties were going to the dogs,
the new Labour Party would remain immune to the general contamination was
perhaps wishful thinking; but it is an example of another charming trait of
his, his robust optimism.
As
a champion of the underdog, the welfare of labour
continued, to the end of his life, to be the mainspring of all his actions. He
was a genuine labour leader who, however, set his
face resolutely against the politicalization of the
Labour Movement. When he was President, he prepared a blueprint called “Jobs
for our Millions” for ending unemployment and underemployment in this country
and presented it to successive governments for initiating action–which has yet
to be done.
My
own acquaintance or, if I may say so, friendship with him goes back to the
early days of independence. He has graciously recalled those days in a little
book called “A Messenger of Friendship” which was presented to me by some of my
friends on my 72nd birthday. “It has been my pleasure and privilege,” wrote Giri, “to have known K. P. S. Menon intimately for more
than three decades. We used to meet very often at 21, Curzon
Road, New Delhi, when Dr. P. P. Pillai used to reside
there as the Director of the I.LO. K. P. S. was Secretary, Foreign Affairs,
when I was High Commissioner for
I
have quoted this as an example of another gracious trait in Giri,
his genius for friendship. If he made a friend he grappled him to his heart
with hoops of steel. It was characteristic of him that when he was Governor of
Kerala he insisted on our staying with him in the Raj Bhavan
in
All
this brings out a quality which has a tendency to recede in the rough and
tumble of our hectic life, namely his warm-heartedness. This was shown in a gracious
gesture which he made immediately after he assumed the office of the President
of India. The first thing he did was to proceed, unheralded,
with his wife to the house of Dr. P. P. Pillai to
whom he was greatly attached and to whom he has referred in the passage quoted,
above from “A Messenger of Friendship.” Dr. P. P. Pillai
was the first Indian to have joined the League of Nations Secretariat and was
primarily associated with the International Labour Organisation. It was their
common interest in labour which formed the basis of
the life-long friendship between one of the best-known Indians of the century,
Dr. V. V. Giri, and the little known but very
estimable international civil servant, Dr. P. P. Pllai;