/Tag: Nehru

HISTORY’S LESSONS


Hindustan Times

Some commentators have compared the struggle led by Anna Hazare with the movement against corruption led by Jayaprakash Narayan in the 1970s. A man of integrity and courage, a social worker who has eschewed the loaves and fishes of office, a septugenerian who has emerged out of semi-retirement to take on an unfeeling government—thus JP then, [...]

NEHRUVIAN INDIANS


The Telegraph

Some years ago, I coined the term ‘Nehruvian Indian’ to describe those who, in their professional and personal lives, ‘transcended the divisions of race and religion, caste and class, gender and geography.’ Viewed cynically, the term was a cloak and cover for my own confusions. Born in Dehradun of Tamil parents, with a Bengali name and [...]

QUESTIONS OF PROPRIETY


Hindustan Times

When, in the year 1974, Mrs Indira Gandhi and Jayaprakash Narayan (JP) became bitter political opponents, there was a peculiar poignancy to their rivalry. For JP and Jawaharlal Nehru had been close friends. So, independently, were JP’s wife Prabhavati and Nehru’s wife Kamala. In fact, before starting an all-India movement against the policies of the Prime [...]

TRAVEL TIPS FOR THE PRIME MINISTER


Hindustan Times

In seventeen years as Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru visited the United States on three separate occasions. Dr Manmohan Singh has been three times to the U. S. in the past year alone. Those on the left of the political spectrum might interpret this as evidence of a dangerous subservience. I do not share this view, not [...]

THE PAST AND FUTURE OF THE INDIAN NATIONAL CONGRESS


Caravan

Not long ago, I found myself in a panel discussion on television with three politicians. One was a Congress Member of Parliament, a second an MP from the Bharatiya Janata Party, the third the President of one of the smaller regional formations. In the course of the conversation I found reason to criticize the three netas [...]

THE TRIPLE TRAGEDY OF THE INDIAN MUSLIMS


The Telegraph

An influential editor from Delhi, visiting Bangalore, hosted a dinner for some local politicians, and invited me along. Among the netas present was the Karnataka Youth Congress president, the spokesman for H. D. Deve Gowda’s Janata Dal (Secular), and an office-bearer of the Bharatiya Janata Party. The conversation turned to the history of communal violence in [...]

THE NORTH-EAST AND THE NATION


The Telegraph

Earlier this year I spent ten days travelling through three states of north-eastern India. My journey began in Manipur, where, on my first night, I had dinner with a bunch of academics and journalists. The humour on display was black: it was aimed chiefly at the two agencies that between them control and dominate the Imphal [...]

NIRAD BABU’S NEHRU


The Hindu

On the 8th of September 1951, The Autobiography of an Unknown Indian was published in London. When the book finally arrived in India, several weeks later, the author sent a copy to his literary mentor, Mohitlal Majumdar. Majumdar soon wrote back with his words of appreciation, but then asked: ‘What does Jawaharlal Nehru think of it?’ [...]

VAJPAYEE’S NEHRU


The Hindu

In the spring of 1977, thirty years of Congress rule ended, and a new Government took power in New Delhi. Politicians who had expected to live out their days in the Opposition were unexpectedly thrust into Ministerial office. In preparation, sycophantic bureaucrats began to take away or hide any visible signs in the secretariat of the [...]