INDIRA GANDHI

Dr. D. ANJANEYULU

For some reason or other, T. S. Eliot described April as the cruelest month in England. For us, however, October (of the Orwellian year of 1984) was undoubtedly the cruelest month in the history of free India. It was on the last day of this month that the folly of man and his foulness cast a dark shadow on this country, the darkest ever in public memory.

Darker perhaps that what befell the nation, some 36 years ago (on 30 January 1948) when Mahatma Gandhi fell to an assassin’s bullet.

It was on a cold winter morning (on 31 October) that Prime Minister Indira Gandhi was brutally done to death by two of her Sikh security men.

The only difference being that there were then a good number of national leaders, like Pandit Nehru, Sardar Patel, Rajen Babu, Maulana Azad, Rajaji and others who could guide the people and control the destiny of the country. We can hardly say the same thing of the present situation. But there is always bound to be the man to rise to the occasion. And he will find his own band of men to help him not only to keep the nation together, but take it forward in the coming years.

During the last 18 or 19 years, we, in this country, had got used to the idea of looking up to Indira Gandhi for guidance, initiative and courage, for leadership and inspiration. She was the constant point of reference for her critics as well as her followers, for the Opposition as well as the party in power, for the whole country of 700 million – in fact, every man, woman and child. She was a living source of the national perspective, the progressive imperative and the urge for collective action. It would be difficult to think of any other political leader, whose image is so deeply engraved in the minds and hearts of her people. Nor do we know the secret of her charisma which lasted so long, which neither ballot could affect nor bullet could destroy.

“Vajradapi kathorani; mriduni kusumaadapi.”–“Softer than a flower; harder than a diamond.” These are the words that come to one’s mind when we think of the complex and compelling personality of Indira Gandhi.

She didn’t conform to the familiar stereotype of the Indian politician; she was too civilized for that.

She was an aristocrat to her fingertips, who walked with kings and queens, Presidents and Prime Ministers, but she always kept the common touch. Nor was she ruthless like the old dictators, nor showy and sentimental, like the new breed of populist leaders.

A stickler for order and discipline, she ruled with an iron hand (beneath the velvet glove, of course), but was careful enough to retain the human response. Though she could be magnanimous, she was never maudlin.

A hero (or heroine, if you will) of many battles at home and abroad, she kept the flag of India flying, but she never crowed over her victories – she took everything in her stride. Braver than a man of her time, she retained her gentlenessas a woman, as a mother. She always remained a lady – elegant, courteous, never ignoring the basic decencies of life.

For parallels, one might go back to Elizabeth the first of England, Catherine the great of Russia and the great Empress Tzu-hsi of Manchu China. But none of them owed their power to their people, while she had been a democrat, through and through, always eager for the stamp of legitimacy even on actions that were resented by some as authoritarian.

The four ideals for which she strove all her life were–democracy, socialism, secularism and peace. Secularism was the very breath of her life. If she staked her life for secularism, it was only a measure of her faith in that ideal. Her brutal and barbaric end was also a measure of the fragility of that concept in the minds of some of us, who have obviously not yet emerged from that state of atavism. If we ever had, we might be reverting fast to a state of barbarity much worse than that of the primitive cave-dwellers. One wonders how near or how far we are to the law of the jungle – where vendetta is supreme and blood is spilled like water.

Indira Gandhi was heir to a rich tradition–of the philosophic East and the scientific West, of Gandhi’s Non-violent Revolution, of Tagore’s Family Man, of her father’s scientific temper and a New International Order.

But she was not too much of an idealist and dreamer like her father. She had her own dreams, though, of a strong, united secular India, where religious fanaticism would be a thing of the past and social tension and economic imbalance had become unknown factors. She was certainly pragmatic enough to know the secrets of the political game. But she might not have bargained for the new barbarism, rearing its head in the name of religious fundamentalism.

If her father had striven hard to build the foundation of modern India, on sound, scientific lines, she had raised on it the complex superstructure that can stand comparison with that of any modern State in the developing world.

It was Nehru, aided by his band of pioneering scientists, led by H. J. Bhabha and S. S. Bhatnagar, who was responsible for evolving a scientific policy for the Government and promoting a scientific temper among the people. It was his daughter, who with the help of an even larger fraternity of new scientists like Vikram Sarabhai, H. D. Sethna, Raja Ramanna and M. G. K. Menon and technologists like Nayudamma, who accelerated the process of equipping the country with a network of modern laboratories, apart from creating the nuclear capability, for peaceful and constructive purposes.

From a place way down at the bottom of the ladder of the world’s industrialised countries three decades ago, India had, during the prime ministership of Indira Gandhi, climbed near the top, taking the seventh place, which is a record that any major-country of the developed world could be proud of.

In agriculture, we are happily past the anxious period of grain deficits and food imports and have entered the era of growing surpluses, thanks to the Green Revolution in the South as well as in the North. There has been a distinct improvement in the levels of domestic consumption which shows that the Indian people are, by and large, better fed, better clothed, even better housed. The only snag has been the population explosion, which has repeatedly upset our five-year plans.

It was during her long stewardship, marked by firmness without fuss, that India’s foreign policy acquired a new sophistication, with the emphasis on deeds rather than words, on results rather than promises and expectations. Thanks to Indira Gandhi’s flair for quiet diplomacy and eagerness to get down to the brasstacks, with quid proquo arrangements wherever necessary, we now can claim to have more friends among the Third World countries, irrespective of their political complexion, than in the days of her father, whose roseate vision of the non-aligned world was not always confirmed by the hard realities of life. Our international relations are now more solid and business-like than in the Nehru era of new evangelism and dramatic gestures, not excluding prolonged fits of “credulity and negligence.”

As chairperson of the Non-aligned Movement (whose membership exceeds a hundred), Indira not only showed new qualities of resourceful leadership, but gave an economic content to what was a political initiative with a philosophic approach. The North-South dialogue and the South-South co-operation became matters of practical importance, with no time to waste on ideological preoccupations. Even the occasional exercises in shadow-boxing became a thing of the past, as was evident in the impressive Delhi meet organised under her guidance. India’s immediate neighbours began to develop a healthy regard, not unmixed with an element of fear.

India, under Indira, could no longer be taken for granted because of the political weight and defence clout. She had the supreme satisfaction of leaving India a lot stronger than she had found it about two decades ago. She mastered the game of Realpolitik, without cynicism or crudity.

A cosmopolitan by temperament and training, Indira Gandhi was a total secularist, in thought, word and deed. She must have had anxious times with the rabid communalists and the compulsive separatists. The action on the Golden Temple was launched by her more in sorrow than in anger. The “Operation Blue Star” was a feather in her cap. Her stature rose in the eyes of all those who swore by the integrity of India and her secular commitment. But, it proved to be her crown of thorns as well.

The politics of violence and the hymns of hate, in parts of the country, strengthening the philosophy of vengeance, saddened the heart of Indira Gandhi. From the occasional disregard of personal safety and security, one might suspect a slight erosion in her will to live.

Somehow, she seemed to have had a premonition of the coming event that still casts its shadow, as she said in Orissa (on her last tour): “Every drop of my blood, I am sure, will contribute to the growth of the nation to make it strong and, dynamic.” We can only hope and pray, after the traumatic experience of the nation, in the shape of her supreme sacrifice, that she had not shed her blood and her life in vain. It was not for nothing that she used to play Joan of Arc in her childhood games.

In the midst of death, there is life; from the encircling gloom comes light; out of depression, there must be hope.

The manner in which Mr. Rajiv Gandhi had been asked to take over his mother’s burden, along with the sorrow on her sudden demise, seems to hold out a hope for the country. He is that rare thing – a third generation Prime Minister, come to power by popular will. He is young, but his youth is not a point against him. He has faced the blow with incredible composure and restraint and borne the burden with quiet courage and confidence, tempered with wonted humility, that has won him the admiration of everyone who had seen him at his mother’s funeral.

All the goodwill of the world, from those at home and abroad, is with him. We can only wish him the best of luck, and say “more power to your elbow.”

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