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INTRODUCTION:
Lal Bahadur Shastri was an Indian political leader who served as the second
Prime Minister of the Republic of India. Influenced by prominent Indian
national leaders like Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru, he plunged into
the Indian independence movement in early 1920s. Before becoming the
Prime Minister of India, he served in a number of other departments like the
railway ministry and the home ministry. With his policies of non alignment
and socialism and influences of Nehruvian socialism in his political thinking,
Shastri became one of the most loved political leaders of all times. He coined
the famous slogan Jai Jawan Jai Kisan during the Indo-Pakistan war of 1965.
His death is still considered as a mystery for nobody knows under what
circumstances he died. He died while he was in the process of signing the
Tashkent Agreement on 10 January 1966 - the formal declaration of the end
of Indo-Pak war. He is the only Indian Prime Minister to have died in office
overseas. He was the first person to be posthumously awarded the India's
highest civilian award, Bharat Ratna.
Childhood & Early Life
Career
That did not deter him from working as the Organizing Secretary of
the Parliamentary Board of U.P. in 1937. He was again sent to
prison for a year for being a part of the nationalist Satyagraha
movement.
When Jawahar Lal Nehru, the then Prime Minister of India, died in
office in 1964, the Congress Party President K. Kamaraj put
Shastris name forward for the post of the Prime Minister. He was
elected the Prime Minister of India the same year.
Under his tenure as the Prime Minister, Shastri lead the country
during India-Pakistan war in 1965 and it was during this war that he
coined the slogan Jai Jawan Jai Kishan. It soon began the national
slogan.
Major Works
Shastri dealt with many basic problems during his tenure in various
ministries - food shortage, unemployment and poverty. To
overcome the acute food shortage, he devised a long-term strategy
- "Green Revolution". Apart from the Green Revolution, he also
helped in promoting the White Revolution.
Lal Bahadurs small town schooling was not remarkable in any way but
he had a happy enough childhood despite the poverty that dogged
him.
As he grew up, Lal Bahadur Shastri became more and more interested
in the countrys struggle for freedom from foreign yoke. He was greatly
impressed by Mahatma Gandhis denunciation of Indian Princes for
their support of British rule in India. Lal Bahadur Sashtri was only
eleven at the time, but the process that was end day to catapult him to
the national stage had already begun in his mind.
Lal Bahadur Shastri was sixteen when Gandhiji called upon his
countrymen to join the Non-Cooperation Movement. He decided at
once to give up his studies in response to the Mahatmas call. The
decision shattered his mothers hopes. The family could not dissuade
him from what they thought was a disastrous course of action. But Lal
Bahadur had made up his mind. All those who were close to him knew
that he would never change his mind once it was made up, for behind
his soft exterior was the firmness of a rock.
Lal Bahadur Shastri joined the Kashi Vidya Peeth in Varanasi, one of the
many national institutions set up in defiance of the British rule. There,
he came under the influence of the greatest intellectuals, and
nationalists of the country. Shastri was the bachelors degree awarded
to him by the Vidya Peeth but has stuck in the minds of the people as
part of his name.
In 1927, he got married. His wife, Lalita Devi, came from Mirzapur,
near his home town. The wedding was traditional in all senses but one.
A spinning wheel and a few yards of handspun cloth was all the dowry.
The bridegroom would accept nothing more.
More than thirty years of dedicated service were behind Lal Bahadur
Shastri. In the course of this period, he came to be known as a man of
great integrity and competence. Humble, tolerant, with great inner
strength and resoluteness, he was a man of the people who
understood their language. He was also a man of vision who led the
country towards progress. Lal Bahadur Shastri was deeply influenced
by the political teachings of Mahatma Gandhi. Hard work is equal to
prayer, he once said, in accents profoundly reminiscent of his Master.
In the direct tradition of Mahatma Gandhi, Lal Bahadur Shastri
represented the best in Indian culture.
birthday with Mahatma Gandhi, the father of the nation. Lal Bahadur was
against the prevailing caste system and therefore decided to drop his
surname. The title "Shastri" was given after the completion of his graduation
at Kashi Vidyapeeth, Varanasi in 1925. The title "Shastri" refers to a "scholar"
or a person, adept in the "Holy Scriptures".
His father Sharada Prasad, a schoolteacher by profession, passed away when
Lal Bahadur was barely two years old. His mother Ramdulari Devi took him
and his two sisters to their maternal grandfather Hazari Lal's house. Lal
Bahadur acquired virtues like boldness, love of adventure, patience, selfcontrol, courtesy, and selflessness in his childhood. After completing his
primary education at Mirzapur, Lal Bahadur was sent to Varanasi, where he
stayed with his maternal uncle.
Young Lal Bahadur, inspired with the stories and speeches of national
leaders, developed a desire to participate in the Indian nationalist
movement. He would also spend time by reading foreign authors like Marx,
Russell and Lenin. In 1915, a speech of Mahatma Gandhi changed the course
of his life and decided to jump into the fire of Indian freedom struggle.
In order to participate actively in the freedom movement, Lal Bahadur
neglected his studies. In 1921, during the non-cooperation movement, called
by Mahatma Gandhi, Lal Bahadur was arrested for demonstrating in defiance
of the prohibitory order. Sine he was a minor then, the authority had to
release him. In 1928, Lal Bahadur Shastri married Lalita Devi, the youngest
daughter of Ganesh Prasad. He was against the prevailing "dowry system"
and so refused to accept dowry. However, on the repeated urging of his
father-in-law, he agreed to accept only five yards of khadi (cotton, usually
handspun) cloth as dowry.
Active Nationalist
In 1930, Lal Bahadur Shastri became the secretary of the Congress party and
later the president of the Allahabad Congress Committee. He played a crucial
role during the "Salt Movement". Lal Bahadur lead a door-to-door campaign,
urging people not to pay land revenue and taxes to the British authority. The
leader was also sent to jail for the campaign. During the long span of nine
years he spent in jails, Lal Bahadur utilized the time in reading the social
reformers and western philosophers. He was one of the leading and
prominent faces that continued the Quit India movement, called by Mahatma
Gandhi. Lal Bahadur, in 1937, was elected to the UP Legislative Assembly.
8
Post Independence
Lal Bahadur Shastri had served in various positions before being elected as
the Prime Minister. After Independence, he became the Minister of police in
the Ministry of Govind Vallabh Panth in Uttar Pradesh. His recommendations
included the introduction of "water-jets" instead of sticks to disperse the
unruly mob. Impressed with his efforts in reforming the state police
department, Jawaharlal Nehru, invited Shastri to join the Union cabinet as a
Minister for railways. He was a responsible man and known for his ethics and
morality. In 1956, Lal Bahadur Shastri resigned from his post, following a
train accident that killed around 150 passengers near Ariyalur in Tamil Nadu.
Nehru, had once said, "No one could wish for a better comrade than Lal
Bahadur, a man of the highest integrity and devoted to ideas".
Lal Bahadur Shastri returned to the Cabinet in 1957, first as the Minister for
Transport and Communications, and then as the Minister of Commerce and
Industry. In 1961, he became Minister for Home and formed the "Committee
on Prevention of Corruption" headed by of K. Santhanam.
Prime Minister
Jawaharlal Nehru was succeeded by a mild-mannered and soft-spoken Lal
Bahadur Shastri on 9 June, 1964. He was a follower of Nehruvian socialism.
Despite the strong influence and desire of becoming the Prime Minister, of
some party stalwarts Shastri emerged as the consensus candidate.
Shastri tackled many elementary problems like food shortage,
unemployment and poverty. To overcome the acute food shortage, Shastri
asked the experts to devise a long-term strategy. This was the beginning of
famous "Green Revolution". Apart from the Green Revolution, he was also
instrumental in promoting the White Revolution. The National Dairy
Development Board was formed in 1965 during Shastri as Prime Minister.
After the Chinese aggression, the major cross-border-problems Shastri faced
was caused by Pakistan. It sent her forces across the eastern border into the
Rann of Kuch in Gujarat. Shastri showing his mettle, made it very clear that
India would not sit and watch. While granting liberty to the Security Forces to
retaliate He said, "Force will be met with force".
The Indo-Pak war ended on 23 September 1965 after the United Nations
passed a resolution demanding a ceasefire. The Russian Prime Minister,
9
Kosygin, offered to mediate and on 10 January 1966, Lal Bahadur Shastri and
his Pakistan counterpart Ayub Khan signed the Tashkent Declaration.
Though the Indian army reached the outskirts of Lahore, Shastri agreed to
withdraw Indian forces. He had always been identified with the interests of
the working class and peasants since the days of his involvement with the
freedom struggle, and now his popularity agree. But his triumph was shortlived: invited in January 1966 by the Russian Premier, Aleksei Kosygin, to
Tashkent for a summit with General Muhammad Ayub Khan, President of
Pakistan and commander of the nation's armed forces, Shastri suffered a
fatal heart attack hours after signing a treaty where India and Pakistan
agreed to not meddle in each other's internal affairs and "not to have
recourse to force and to settle their disputes through peaceful means.
Shastri's body was brought back to India, and a memorial, not far from the
national memorial to Mahatma Gandhi, was built to honor him. It says, in
fitting testimony to Shastri, "Jai Jawan, Jai Kisan" ("Honor the Soldier, Honor
the Farmer"). He is, however, a largely forgotten figure, another victim of the
engineering of India's social memory by Indira Gandhi and her clan.
2nd October is celebrated as Mahatma Gandhi Jayanti. Indias second Prime
Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri was also born on the same date in 1904.
Freedom fighter and India's second Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri shared
his birthday with Father of Nation, Mahatma Gandhi. On his 111th birth
anniversary here are 5 things one must know about Shastriji.
The story behind 'Jai Jawan Jai Kisan'
When Lal Bahadur Shastri took over as a Prime Minister in 1964, India used
to be a food importing country then. It depended on food imports from North
America under the PL-480 scheme. In 1965, when we were at war with
Pakistan, India faced drought as well. Keeping in mind, the food situation and
the prevailing hunger, Shastri had urged the entire country to hold a fast for
a day. Lal Bahadur Shastri knew and understood the significance of soldiers
and farmers and gave slogan during that period - Jai Jawan Jai Kisan.
Shastri's conflict with American President Lyndon Johnson
Towards the end of 1965 and before his death on January 11, 1966, in an
interview with an American journalist, Lal Bahadur Shastri, despite his
dependency on America for food import, didn't nod his head and said the war
by America in Vietnam was an act of aggression. His statement wasn't
received well by the American counterpart who then stopped food exports to
India under a 'Stop-go-policy'. India was then in such a miserable situation
that the Food & Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations had to appeal
to the US to resume food exports.
11
Related read: Lal Bahadur Shastri's son requests PM Modi to declassify files
related to father's death
He wasn't a born 'Shastri'
Lal Bahadur Shastri was born in Ramnagar of Varanasi in a Kayastha family,
but because he didnt believe in the caste system, he gave up his title. It was
not until later, when he graduated from Kashi Vidyapeeth, the title of Shastri
(scholar) was awarded to him.
As a minister in Jawahar Lal Nehru's cabinet, Shastri set some milestones
that are still followed
As a Transport Minister, Lal Bahadur Shastri was the first in India to make it
possible for women to be appointed as conductors in transportation facilities.
It was also Shastri's idea to use jets of water to disperse the crowd rather
than lathi-charge.
His first address to nation as a Prime Minister
There comes a time in the life of every nation when it stands at the
crossroads of history and must choose which way to go. But for us there
need to be no difficulty or hesitation, no looking to right or left. Our way is
straight and clearthe building up of a socialist democracy at home with
freedom and prosperity for all, and the maintenance of world peace and
friendship with all nations.
child, took her two children and moved from Ramnnagar to her father's
house in Mughalsarai and settled there for good. She gave birth to a
daughter, Sundari Devi, in July 1906. [2][5] Thus, Shastri and his sisters grew up
in the household of his maternal grandfather, Hazari Lal. However, Hazari Lal
himself died from a stroke in mid-1908, after which the family were looked
after by his brother (Shastri's great-uncle) Darbari Lal, who was the head
clerk in the opium regulation department at Ghazipur, and later by his son
(Ramdulari Devi's cousin) Bindeshwari Prasad, a school teacher in
Mughalsarai. Thus, the greatness of the traditional Indian joint family system,
and the traditions of family responsibility and kinship, are deeply evident in
Shastri's case, where the orphan child of a penniless widow was raised by his
distant relatives in a manner which enabled him to become Prime Minister of
India.
In Shastri's family, as with many Kayastha families, it was the custom in that
era for children to receive an education in the Urdu language and culture.
This is because Urdu/Persian had been the language of government for
centuries, before being replaced by English, and old traditions persisted into
the 20th century. Therefore, Shastri began his education at the age of four
under the tutelage of a maulvi (a Muslim cleric), Budhan Mian, at the East
Central Railway Inter college in Mughalsarai. He studied there until the sixth
standard. In 1917, Bindeshwari Prasad (who was now head of the household)
was transferred to Varanasi, and the entire family moved there, including
Ramdulari Devi and her three children. In Varanasi, Shastri joining the
seventh standard at Harish Chandra High School. [2] At this time, he decided
to drop his caste-derived surname of "Varma" (which is a traditional optional
surname for all Kayastha families).
The young satyagrahi (19211945)
While Shastri's family had no links to the independence movement then
taking shape, among his teachers at Harish Chandra High School was an
intensely patriotic and highly respected teacher named Nishkameshwar
Misra, who gave Shastri much-needed financial support by allowing him to
tutor his children. Inspired by Misra's patriotism, Shastri took a deep interest
in the freedom struggle, and began to study its history and the works of
several of its noted personalities, including those of Swami Vivekananda, Bal
Gangadhar Tilak, Gandhi and Annie Besant. In January 1921, when Shastri
was in the 10 standard and three months from sitting the final examinations,
he attended a public meeting in Benares hosted by Gandhi and Pandit Madan
Mohan Malaviya. Inspired by the Mahatma's call for students to withdraw
13
State minister
Following India's independence, Shastri was appointed Parliamentary
Secretary in his home state, Uttar Pradesh. He became the Minister of Police
and Transport under Govind Ballabh Pant's Chief Ministership on 15 August
1947 following Rafi Ahmed Kidwai's departure to become minister at centre.
As the Transport Minister, he was the first to appoint women conductors. As
the minister in charge of the Police Department, he ordered that police use
jets of water instead of lathis to disperse unruly crowds.[17] His tenure as
police minister (As Home Minister was called prior to 1950) saw successful
curbing of communal riots in 1947, mass migration and resettlement of
refugees.[citation needed]
Cabinet minister
In 1951, Shastri was made the General Secretary of the All-India Congress
Committee with Jawaharlal Nehru as the Prime Minister. He was directly
responsible for the selection of candidates and the direction of publicity and
electioneering activities. He played an important role in the landslide
successes of the Congress Party in the Indian General Elections of 1952,
1957 and 1962. In 1952, he successfully contested UP Vidhansabha from
Soraon North cum Phulpur West seat and won getting over 69% of vote. He
was believed to be retained as home minister of UP, but in a surprise move
was called to Centre as minister by Nehru.
He was elected to Rajya Sabha from Uttar Pradesh w.e.f. 3 April 1952. He
served as the Minister of Railways and Transport in the Central Cabinet from
13 May 1952 to 7 December 1956. In September 1956, he offered his
resignation after a railway accident at Mahbubnagar that led to 112 deaths.
However, Nehru did not accept his resignation.[18]Three months later, he
resigned accepting moral and constitutional responsibility for a railway
accident at Ariyalur in Tamil Nadu that resulted in 144 deaths. While
speaking in Parliament on the incident, Nehru stated that he was accepting
the resignation because it would set an example in constitutional propriety
and not because Shastri was in any way responsible for the accident.[5]
As the Railway Minister Shastri installed the 1st Machine at Integral Coach
Factory ICF Chennai on 20.02.1955.
In 1957, Shastri returned to the Cabinet following the General Elections, first
as the Minister for Transport and Communications, and then as the Minister
of Commerce and Industry.[10] In 1961, he became Home Minister.[5] As Union
Home Minister, he was instrumental in appointing the Committee on
Prevention of Corruption under the Chairmanship of K. Santhanam.[19] During
15
increase the production and supply of milk by supporting the Amul milk cooperative of Anand, Gujarat and creating the National Dairy Development
Board.[19]
He visited Anand on 31 October 1964 for inauguration of the Cattle Feed
Factory of Amul at Kanjari. As he was keenly interested in knowing the
success of this co-operative, he stayed overnight with farmers in a village,
and even had dinner with a farmer's family. He discussed his wish with Mr
Verghese Kurien, then the General Manager of Kaira District Co-operative
Milk Producers Union Ltd (Amul) to replicate this model to other parts of the
country for improving the socio-economic conditions of farmers. As a result
of this visit, the National Dairy Development Board (NDDB) was established
at Anand in 1965
While speaking on the chronic food shortages across the country, Shastri
urged people to voluntarily give up one meal so that the food saved could be
distributed to the affected populace. However he ensured that he first
implemented the system in his own family before appealing to the country.
He went on air to appeal to his countrymen to skip a meal a week. The
response to his appeal was overwhelming. Even restaurants and eateries
downed the shutters on Monday evenings. Many parts of the country
observed the "Shastri Vrat". He motivated the country to maximize the
cultivation of food grains by ploughing the lawn himself, at his official
residence in New Delhi.
During the 22-day war with Pakistan in 1965, On 19 October 1965, Shastri
gave the seminal Jai Jawan Jai Kishan ("Hail the soldier, Hail the
farmer")slogan at Urwa in Allahabad that became a national slogan.
Underlining the need to boost India's food production. Shastri also promoted
the Green Revolution. Though he was a socialist, Shastri stated that India
cannot have a regimented type of economy.[19]
The Food Corporation of India was set up under the Food Corporation's Act
1964. Also The National Agricultural Products Board Act.
Jai Jawan Jai Kisan
For the outstanding slogan given by him during Indo-Pak war of
1965 Ministry of Information and Broadcasting (India) commemorated
Shastriji even after 47 years of his death on his 48th martyr's day:
Former Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri was one of those great Indians
who has left an indelible impression on our collective life. Shri Lal Bahadur
Shastri's contribution to our public life were unique in that they were made in
17
the closest proximity to the life of the common man in India. Shri Lal Bahadur
Shastri was looked upon by Indians as one of their own, one who shared their
ideals, hopes and aspirations. His achievements were looked upon not as the
isolated achievements of an individual but of our society collectively.
Under his leadership India faced and repulsed the Pakistani invasion of 1965.
It is not only a matter of pride for the Indian Army but also for every citizen
of the country. Shri Lal Bahadur Shastri's slogan Jai Jawan! Jai
Kisan!! reverberates even today through the length and breadth of the
country. Underlying this is the inner-most sentiments 'Jai Hind'. The war of
1965 was fought and won for our self-respect and our national prestige. For
using our Defence Forces with such admirable skill, the nation remains
beholden to Shri Lal Bahadur Shastri. He will be remembered for all times to
come for his large heartedness and public service.[21]
Foreign policies
Shastri continued Nehru policy of non-alignment but also built closer
relations with the Soviet Union. In the aftermath of the Sino-Indian War of
1962 and the formation of military ties between the Chinese People's
Republic and Pakistan, Shastri's government decided to expand the defence
budget of India's armed forces.
In 1964, Shastri signed an accord with the Sri Lankan Prime
minister Sirimavo Bandaranaike regarding the status of Indian Tamils in the
then Ceylon.[22] This agreement is also known as the Sirima-Shastri Pact or
the Bandaranaike-Shastri pact.[23]
Under the terms of this agreement, 600,000 Indian Tamils were to be
repatriated, while 375,000 were to be granted Sri Lankan citizenship. This
settlement was to be done by 31 October 1981. However, after Shastri's
death, by 1981, India had taken only 300,000 Tamils as repatriates, while Sri
Lanka had granted citizenship to only 185,000 citizens (plus another 62,000
born after 1964). Later, India declined to consider any further applications for
citizenship, stating that the 1964 agreement had lapsed.[22]
India's relationship with Burma had been strained after the 1962 Military
coup followed by the repatriation of many Indian families in 1964 by Burma.
While the central government in New Delhi monitored the overall process of
repatriation and arranged for identification and transportation of the Indian
returnees from Burma, it fell under the responsibilities of local governments
18
19
The Indo-Pak war ended on 23 September 1965 with a United Nationsmandated ceasefire. In a broadcast to the nation on the day of the ceasefire,
Shastri stated:[20]
"While the conflict between the armed forces of the two countries has come
to an end, the more important thing for the United Nations and all those who
stand for peace is to bring to an end the deeper conflict.... How can this be
brought about? In our view, the only answer lies in peaceful coexistence.
India has stood for the principle of coexistence and championed it all over
the world. Peaceful coexistence is possible among nations no matter how
deep the differences between them, how far apart they are in their political
and economic systems, no matter how intense the issues that divide them."
During his tenure as Prime Minister, Shastri visited many countries
including Russia, Yugoslavia, England, Canada, Nepal, Egypt and Burma.
[10]
Incidentally while returning from the Non Alliance Conference in Cairo on
the invitation of then President of the Pakistan, Mohammed Ayub Khan to
have lunch with him, Shastri made a stop over at Karachi Airport for few
hours and breaking from the protocol Ayub Khan personally received him at
the Airport and had an informal meeting during October 1964. After the
declaration of ceasefire with Pakistan in 1965, Shastri and Ayub Khan
attended a summit in Tashkent (former USSR, now in modern Uzbekistan),
organized by Alexei Kosygin. On 10 January 1966, Shastri and Ayub Khan
signed the Tashkent Declaration.
Shastri's
sudden
death
immediately
after
signing
the Tashkent
Pact with Pakistan raised many questions in the minds of Indian citizens.
The Prime Minister of India going to Tashkent for a pact and never coming
back has not been accepted easily by Indian citizens. His health was fit
according to his doctor, R. N. Chugh, and he had no sign of heart trouble
before.
Shastri's sudden death has led to persistent conspiracy theories that he was
poisoned.[26] The first inquiry into his death, conducted by the Raj Narain
Inquiry, as it came to be known, however did not come up with any
conclusions, and today no record of this inquiry exists with the Indian
Parliament's library.[27] It was alleged that no post-mortem was done on
Shastri, but the Indian government in 2009, claimed it did have a report of a
medical investigation conducted by Shastri's doctor and some Russian
doctors. Furthermore, the Prime Minister's Office (PMO) revealed that there
was no record of any destruction or loss of documents in the PMO having a
20
exempted from disclosure under the RTI Act. It sent the rest of the questions
to the Ministry of External Affairs and Home Ministry to answer. The MEA said
the only document from the erstwhile Soviet Government is "the report of
the Joint Medical Investigation conducted by a team comprising R. N. Chugh,
Doctor in-Attendance to the PM and some Russian doctors" and added no
post-mortem was conducted in the USSR. The Home Ministry referred the
matter to Delhi Police and National Archives for the response pertaining to
any post-mortem conducted on the body of Shastri in India. Sunil Shastri, son
of the former Prime Minister, called the transferring of application as
"absurd" and "silly joke". "He (Lal Bahadur Shastri) died as sitting Prime
Minister. It sounds very silly that MHA is referring the matter of death of
second Prime Minister of India to a district level police." He also demanded
that "It should be looked into by highest authorities like President, Prime
Minister and home minister."[36]
Later, Gregory Douglas, a journalist who interviewed former CIA
operative Robert Crowley over a period of 4 years, recorded their telephone
conversations and published a transcription in a book titled Conversations
with the Crow. In the book, Crowley claimed that the CIA was responsible for
eliminating Homi Bhabha, an Indian nuclear scientist whose plane crashed
into Alps, when he was going to attend a conference in Vienna; and Lal
Bahadur Shastri. Crowley said that the USA was wary of India's rigid stand on
nuclear policy and of then prime minister Lal Bahadur Shastri, who wanted to
go ahead with nuclear tests. He also said that the agency was worried about
collective domination by India and Russia over the region, for which a strong
deterrent was required.
On 16 May 1928, Shastri married Lalita Devi a lady from Mirzapur. The
marriage, which was arranged by their parents in the traditional Indian way,
was harmonious and conventional. The couple were blessed with four sons
and two daughters, namely
1. Kusum Shastri, the eldest daughter
2. Hari Krishna Shastri, eldest son, who was married to Vibha Shastri
3. Suman Shastri, second daughter, married to Vijay Nath Singh. Her son,
Siddharth Nath Singh, is a spokesman of the Bharatiya Janata Party
4. Anil Shastri. He is married to Manju Shastri. Alone in his family, he
remains a member of his father's Congress Party. His son Adarsh
22
23
24
Kuldip Nayar, Shastri's media advisor from 1960 to 1964, recalls that,
during the Quit India Movement, his daughter was ill and he was
released on parole from jail. However, he could not save her life
because doctors had prescribed costly drugs. Later on in 1963, on the
day when he was dropped from the cabinet, he was sitting in his home
in the dark, without a light. When asked about the reason, he said as
he no longer is a minister, all expenses will have to be paid by himself
and that as a MP and minister he didn't earn enough to save for time of
need.[41]
Although Shastri had been a cabinet minister for many years in the
1950s, he was poor when he died. All he owned at the end was an old
car, which he had bought in instalments from the government and for
which he still owed money. He was a member of Servants of India
society (which included Gandhi, Lala Lajpat Rai, Gopal Krishna Gokhle)
which asked all its members to shun accumulation of private property
and remain in public life as servants of people. He was the first railway
minister who resigned from office following a major train accident as
he felt moral responsibility.
25
Lal Bahadur Shastri inaugurated the Jawahar Dock of the Chennai Port
Trust & starts the construction work of Tuticorin Port (Now VOC Port
Trust) in November 1964.
Shastri was known for his honesty and humility throughout his life. He
was the first person to be posthumously awarded the Bharat Ratna,
and a memorial "Vijay Ghat" was built for him in Delhi.
The Shastri Indo-Canadian Institute was named after Shastri due to his
role in promoting scholarly activity between India and Canada.[42]
In
2011,
on
Shastri's
45th
death
anniversary, Uttar
Pradesh Government announced to renovate Shastri's ancestral house
at Ramnagar inVaranasi and declared plans to convert it into a
biographical museum.[1][44]
Lal Bahadur Shastri Centre For Indian Culture with a Monument and a
street is named after him in the city of Tashkent, Uzbekistan.
Few stadiums are named after him in the cities of Hyderabad, Andhra
Pradesh Ahmadabad in Gujarat and another one at Kollam, Kerala.
Shastri Road in Kottayam,Kerala[46]
RBI released coins in the denomination of Rs.5 during his birth century
celebrations.
All India Lal Bahadur Shastri Hockey tournament is held every year
since 1991 a major tournament in the field of Hockey.
The Left Bank Canal form the Nagarjuna Sagar Dam in AP is named Lal
Bahadur Shastri Canal which is 295 km in Length.
Life
size
bust
of
Shastri
are
erected
Thiruvandram,Pune,Varanasi(Airport),Ahmedabad
side),Khrushetra,Shimla,Kasargod,Indore,Jalandar,Mhow,Uran.
Some
major
roads
in
the
cities
Delhi,Mumbai,Pune,Puduchery,Lucknow,Warangal
and
bearing the name of the legend.
at
(lake
of
New
Allahabad
- one of modern India's icons whose enduring popularity cuts through all
divides. What really happened in the wee hours of January 11 in Tashkent
26
Generations have gone by, but conspiracy theories about what caused
Shastris death have not ceased. In some other country, the strange case of
a prime ministers death would have been inquired into by a high-powered
team long ago and all relevant documents placed in the public domain.
After signing the Tashkent accord, around 4pm on January 10, prime minister
Shastri reached the villa he was provided by his Russian hosts. Late in the
evening, he had a light meal prepared by Jan Mohammad, the personal cook
of TN Kaul, the Indian ambassador to Moscow.
There were other Russian butlers at his service in the same villa. At 11.30pm,
Shastri had a glass of milk brought by the ambassador's cook. When his
personal staff took leave of him at that time, he was fine.
But around 1.25am on January 11, Shastri woke up, coughing severely. The
room he was in had no phone or intercom. So he walked out to another room
to tell his staff to inform his personal doctor RN Chugh. By the time Dr Chugh
arrived, Shastri was dying. The symptoms were of a heart attack. There was
not much Dr Chugh could do now. He began to cry. "Babuji, you did not give
me enough time." Shastri took Lord Ram's name and he was gone.
What happened next had a ring of unusualness about it. Given here for your
consideration are four reasons that make Shastris death suspicious:
At 4am, Ahmed Sattarov, the Russian butler attached to Shastri, was rudely
woken up by an officer of the Ninth Directorate of the KGB (responsible for
the safety of VIPs). In Sattarov's own words, the KGB officer "said that they
suspected the Indian prime minister had been poisoned".
Sattarov was handcuffed and, along with three junior butlers, was rounded
off to a location 30km away. Their harsh interrogation commenced in a
27
dungeon. After some time, Jan Mohammad was brought in. In Sattarov's
words again: "We thought that it must have been that man who poisoned
Shastri."
Decades after the harrowing interrogation he was subjected to, Sattarov
continued to reel under its impact. "We were so nervous that the hair on the
temple of one of my colleagues turned gray before our eyes, and ever since I
stutter".
2. Shastris near and dear ones see a needle of suspicion pointing towards an
insider's hand
When Shastris body was brought to Delhi, no one had any clue about what
the KGB was suspecting. But seeing strange blue patches on Shastris body,
his mother screamed that someone had poisoned her son. Mere bitwa ko
jahar de diya! The old womans wail continues to haunt the Shastri family
till date.
Shastris sons Anil and Sunil Shastri (one in Congress, another in BJP) and
grandsons Sanjay and Siddharth Nath Singh have often spoken about their
ongoing anguish and pain about what happened so long ago.
Shastris wife Lalita died thinking that her husband had been poisoned. Other
family members and near and dear ones, like childhood friend TN Singh and
close follower Jagdish Kodesia, were not able to make sense of the cut marks
on Shastri's stomach and back of the neck. The cut on his neck was pouring
blood and the sheets, pillows and clothes used by him were all soaked in
blood. A grandson of Shastri told me that he still has his nanajis bloodsoaked cap.
Back in 1966, the family sought clarification and action from the
government. Whatever was done did not satisfy them. Kodesia, a former
Delhi Congress chief, even began to think that Shastris death had some link
to the Netaji mystery.
Veteran journalist Kuldip Nayar, who was in Tashkent on that fateful day as
Shastris advisor, opened up recently to state that his suspicions were
aroused some time after the tragedy when a Member of Parliament raked up
the charges of poisoning and TN Kaul, by then the foreign secretary, "rang
me up to issue a statement" against it.
Jan Mohammed was employed in the Rashtrapati Bhavan after the Tashkent
tragedy.
Dr Chugh, his wife and two sons were run over by a truck in 1977. Only his
daughter survived, but was crippled.
The only sure-shot way to find out whether or not Shastriji was poisoned was
to carry out a post-mortem on his body. The family demanded it. But the
demand was not accepted. Interim prime minister Gulzarilal Nanda was to
later on feign ignorance about Shastris family approaching him with the
demand.
In 2009, I tried to get some clarity on the issue by filing RTI applications. The
prime minister's office (PMO) told me that it possessed only one classified
document relating to the former prime ministers death, and that there was
no record of any destruction or loss of any document related to the tragedy.
The ministry of external affairs (MEA) informed me on July 1, 2009 that the
division concerned had no information on the subject. It was quite strange
because the sudden death of the prime minister must have thrown the
Indian embassy in Moscow and the ministry in New Delhi into a tizzy.
Ambassador Kaul must have scrambled to inform Delhi of the tragedy. The
ministry would have gone on an overdrive to find out the circumstances
leading to the prime ministers death. The ambassador must have been
asked to send blow-by-blow reports, and he must have done that.
The Russians too would have felt obliged to tell the Indians about their
handling of the matter. And as the charges of foul play emerged, the
29
government of India, through the ministry of external of affairs (and also the
intellligence bureau, which was then responsible for foreign intelligence),
must have tried to get to the bottom of the story. So how could the division
in the ministry have no records?
Mishra upheld the PMOs decision in withholding the single secret record with
it. Later, I learned that this record contained a conspiracy theory that the
Americans had spread rumours about foul play in Shastris death. I see
nothing to back this mindless charge.
Anyhow, today there must be several classified records about Shastris death
in the non-accessible archives of our intelligence agencies. The Russians will
have interrogation records of the butlers at least. In the fullness of time all of
that must come out. Perhaps time has come for Shastrijis family to seek an
appointment with the prime minister.
Janpath to the residence of then Industries minister T.N. Singh at 16, Ashoka
Road , which was quite a distance.
Lal Bahadur was born on October 2nd, 1904 at Mughalsarai, seven miles
from Kashi. His parents were Sharada Prasad and Ramdulari Devi. They were
agriculturists. Srivastava was part of Lal Bahadur's name. He dropped that
part indicating his caste when he grew up. He did not like such indications of
caste.
Lal Bahadurs father was a poor teacher at first. Then he became a clerk in
the Revenue Office at Allahabad. Here, too, he earned very little. But, even
though he was poor, he never accepted bribes. He lived a life of honesty and
integrity.
Sharada Prasad died when Lal Bahadur was only a year old. Ramdulari Devi
felt as though the skies had come down on her.
Her father gave shelter to her and her three children, a boy and two girls.
Lal Bahadur's grandfather Hazari Lai's family was very large. His brothers,
their wives and children, besides his own children and grand children, lived
under the same roof. It was a small world in itself and Hazari Lai was the
fountain of love and affection to all of them. He looked after every one in the
family with love. He was especially fond of little Lal Bahadur. He always
affectionately called him 'Nanhe' which means 'tiny'.
An interesting incident took place when Lal Bahadur was only three months
old. The mother went to bathe in the holy Ganga with her child. In the milling
crowd at the bathing ghat she lost her child. The child had slipped from his
mother's arms into a cowherd's basket. The cowherd had no children, So he
took the child as a gift from God and celebrated the event with great joy.
The mother was lost in grief. A complaint was lodged with the police. They
traced the child. The foster parents wept bitterly to give back the child. Lal
Bahadur, who was destined to govern the country, narrowly missed the 'good
fortune' of becoming a cowherd.
Lal Bahadur stayed at his grandfather's house till he was ten. By that time he
had passed the sixth standard examination. There was no high school in that
place. They sent him to Kashi for further education.
32
Courage and self-respect were two virtues, which took deep root in him from
his childhood. While in Kashi, he went with his friends to see a fair on the
other bank of the Ganga. On the way back he had no money for the boat
fare. His self-respect did not allow him to ask his friends for money. He
slipped from their company without their knowledge. His friends forgot him in
their talk and boarded the boat. When the boat had moved away, Lal
Bahadur jumped into the river; as his friends watched breathlessly he swam
to the other bank safely.
Though Lal Bahadur was, a man of small build, he was unusually strong. His
moral strength was even greater. As in water so in life he swam quite
successfully. Twice he was about to be drowned but was saved. It is said that
when he was saved the second time, he had his teachers three-year-old
baby on his shoulders.
Lal Bahadur acquired virtues likeboldness, love of adventure, patience, selfcontrol, courtesy and selflessness in hischildhood.
Even as a boy he loved to read books. He read whatever books he came
across, whether he understood them or not. He was fond of Guru Nanak's
verses.
He used to repeat the following lines often:
"0 Nanak! Be tiny like grass,
For other plants will whither away, but grass will remain ever green."
An incident, which took place when he was six years old, seems to have left
a deep mark on his mind. Once he went to an orchard with his friends. He
was standing below while his friends climbed the trees. He plucked a flower
from a bush.
The gardener came in the meantime and saw Lal Bahadur. The boys on the
trees climbed down and ran away. The gardener caught Lal Bahadur. He beat
him severely.
Lal Bahadur wept and said, "I am orphan. Do not beat me."
The gardener smiled with pity and said, "Because you are an orphan, you
must learn better behavior, my boy."
33
The words of the gardener had a great effect on him. He swore to him, "I
shall behave better in future. Because I am an orphan I must learn good
behavior."
Though short he was not timid at school. All boys were friendly with him. Like
the grass he always looked fresh and smiling. Not only during his school days
but also in his later life he did not hate anyone. It seems he used to act in
plays at school. He played the role of Kripacharya in the play
'Mahabharatha'. Kripacharya was in the court of Duryodhana and yet was
loved by the Pandavas. Lal Bahadur Shastri had acquired the same worth.
Even when Lal Bahadur was a student of Harischandra. High School at
Varanasi a whirlwind had disturbed India.
Everywhere there was the cry of 'Freedom'! "Swaraj is our birth right" - Bala
Gangadhara Tilak had declared. This had become the nation's battlecry.
Lal Bahadur reverenced Tilak. He longed to see him and hear his speech.
Once Tilak visited Varanasi. Lal Bahadur was away in a village fifty miles from
Varanasi. He borrowed money and traveled in a train to see and hear Tilak.
He saw him and heard his speech. It reverberated in his ears like Krishna's
conch, thePanchajanya. Like Bharata, carrying Rama's sandals on his head,
Lal Bahadur carried Tilak's message in his heart. This message guided him
all through his life.The greatest influence on Lal Bahadur was that of
Mahatma Gandhi. Lal Bahadur was electrified when he heard a speech of
Gandhi at Varanasi in 1915. Then and there he dedicated his life to the
service of the country.
n 1921, Mahatma Gandhi launched the non-cooperation movement against
British Government and declared that the country would not cooperate with
the Government in its unjust rule. Lal Bahadur was then only seventeen
years. When Mahatma Gandhi gave a call to the youth to come out of
Government schools and colleges, offices and courts and to sacrifice
everything for the sake of freedom, Lal Bahadur came out of his school.
His mother and other relatives advised him not to give up his studies. But Lal
Bahadur was firm in his decision -Lai Bahadur joined the procession, which
disobeyed the prohibitory order. The police arrested him. But as he was too
young, he was let off.
34
Lal Bahadur did not go back to his school. He became a student of Kashi
Vidya Peeth. During his four years' stay there, he made excellent progress.
Dr.Bhagawandas's lectures on philosophy went straight to his heart. In later
life Lal Bahadur displayed surprising poise in the midst of conflict and
confusion. This he learnt from his teacher, Bhagawandas.
It was in 1926 that Lal Bahadur got the degree of 'Shastri' and left the Kashi
Vidya Peeth. The whole country became the arena of his activity. He became
the life- member of The Servants of the People Society, which Lala Lajpat Rai
had started in 1921. The aim of the Society was to train youths that were
prepared to dedicate their lives to the service of the country.
One of the rules of the Society required the members to take an oath to
serve the Society at least for twenty years and to lead a simple and honest
life till the end. Lal Bahadur earned the love and affection of Lajpat Rai by his
earnestness and hard work. Later he became the President of the Society.
Shastriji married in 1927. Lalitha Devi, his bride, came from Mirzalyur. The
wedding was celebrated in the simplest way. All that the bridegroom took as
a gift from father-in-law was a charaka and a few yards of Khadi.
The struggle for freedom was intensifield all over the country in 1930.
Mahatma Gandhi started the 'Salt Satyagraha'. Lal Bahadur took a leading
role in it.
From this time onwards prison became his second home. He was sent to
prison seven times and was forced to spend nine long years in various
prisons on different occasions.
His going to prison was a blessing in disguise. He had time to read a number
of good books. He became familiar with the works of western philosophers,
35
Lal Bahadur's virtues shone even in the prison. He was a ideal prisoner. 'He
was a model to others in discipline and restraint. Many political prisoners
used to quarrel among themselves for small things. They used to cringe for
small favors before the officials of the prison. But Lal Bahadur used to give
up his comforts for others.
The greatness of Lal Bahadur was that he maintained his self-respect 'even
in prison. Once when he was in prison, one of his daughters fell seriously ill.
The officers agreed to let him out for a short time but on condition that he
should agree in writing not to take part in the freedom 'movement during
this period. Lal Bahadur did not wish to participate in the freedom movement
during his temporary release from prison; but he said that he would not give
it in writing. He thought that it was against his self-respect to give it in
writing. The officers knew that he was truthful. Therefore they did not insist.
Lal Bahadur was released for fifteen days.
But his daughter died before he, reached home. After performing the
obsequies he returned to his prison even before the expiry of the period.
A year passed. His son was laid up with influenza this time. Lal Bahadur was
permitted unconditionally to go home for a week. But the fever did not come
down in a week. Lal Bahadur got ready to go back to prison. The boy pleaded
dumbly with his tearful eyes.
For a moment the father's mind was shaken. Tears rolled down from his eyes.
But the next moment his decision was made. He bade good bye to all and
left his home for prison. His son survived.
36
Two qualities, which the leader of any nation must have, are devotion and
efficiency. Lal Bahadur had both the qualities in a large measure. He would
not swerve from his aim, come what may. When the people of India. Were
fighting for freedom he brushed aside all thought of personal happiness and
plunged into the freedom struggle. His daughter'sdeath, his son's illness,
poverty - none of these made him swerve from his selection path. Even when
he became a minister and, later, the Prime Minister he was never attracted
to a life of luxury and comfort.
When the Second World War broke out in 1939, the leaders of our country
were in a dilemma. When the people of India were slaves how could they
support the cause of Britain?
The freedom struggle became more widespread and intense. The prisons
were bursting with political prisoners.
On 8th August 1942, the Indian National Congress which led the fight for
freedom decided at its historic meeting in Bombay to sound the trumpet for
the final struggle against the British in India. It called on the British to 'Quit
India'. The people were determined to 'do or die'.
The government reacted sharply to these calls and arrested many leaders.
Prisons became over-crowded. The government used all cruel methods of
suppression to nip the movement in the bud.
Lal Bahadur, who had just then come out after a year in prison, traveled from
Bombay to Allahabad by train. He got off at a station, unknown to the police.
For a whole week he used to send instructions to the freedom fighters from
Anand Bhavan, Jawaharlal Nehru's home in Allahabad.
37
Vijayalakshmi Pandit, the sister of Nehru, lived in Anand Bhavan at the time.
The police came there to arrest her and to take possession of the house. Lal
Bahadur destroyed all-important documents. Luckily, the police arrested only
Vijayalakshmi Pandit and went away.
A few days later Lal Bahadur who was underground came out and shouted
slogans against the government. The police arrested him then.
India got freedom in 1947.Lal Bahadur's administrative ability and skill in
organization came to light in the days following India's freedom. He was an
expert in the art of bringing together people and winning their hearts. Pandit
Govind Vallabh Pant, the leader of Uttar Pradesh, was the first to recognize
this talent of Shastriji and to encourage him. He earned the love of Pant by
his hard work during the elections of 1946 in the provinces. The Congress
Office had become Shastriji's home during that period. The Congress won a
resounding victory in the elections.
When Govind Vallabh Pant became the Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh, he
wished to train able young men to run the government. But it was not easy
to please him. Lal Bahadur did not want any office; yet he was appointed as
Parliamentary Secretary to Pant. Pant praised him as 'likable, hard-working,
devoted, trustworthy and non-controversial'.
Later, in 1947, Lal Bahadur became the Minister of Police and Transport in
Pant's Ministry. He took many steps to bring discipline into the
administration. As Transport Minister he subjected government buses to
discipline. He was the first to appoint women conductors. Usually the
minister in charge of the Police Department will not remain popular for long.
But Lal Bahadur Shastri never allowed the police to resort to lathi charge and
firing. He ordered that using jets of water instead of lathis should disperse
unruly crowds. Though there were many strikes in Uttar Pradesh when he
was in office, there was not a single occasion when people shouted slogans
against him.
Lal Bahadur was a lover of cricket. Once he was watching a match at Kanpur.
Trouble broke out among the spectators. The Police and young men came to
blows. Since Shastriji was on the spot thesituation did not go out of control.
38
The young men demanded that the red turbans' (thepolice) should not be
found on the cricket ground and Lal Bahadur agreed. But the police were
there the next day. The young men became angry with Shastriji and
protested. Lal Bahadur laughed and said, "I fulfilled my promise to you
faithfully. You did not want red turbans to be here. You see the police are now
wearing khaki turbans." The spectators laughed and dropped the matter.
In the first General Elections after India became a Republic, the Congress
Party returned to power with a huge majority. Lal Bahadur Shastri worked
hard for this success. He was the General Secretary of the Congress at the
General Secretary of the Congress at the time. The selection of candidates
and the direction of publicity and electioneering were under the direct
guidance of Shastriji. But he did not contest the elections. However, Nehru
did not wish to leave such an able and honest man outside the government.
He persuaded him to seek election to the Rajya Sabha. He was elected to the
Rajya Sabha. He was appointed as the Railways and Transport Minister in the
Central Cabinet (1952).
The railways are among the biggest Central Government undertakings,
transport plays a vital role in the progress of any country. The railways in
India had been badly disrupted after the division of the country. Lal Bahadur
strove hard to set right and regulate the railways. It is not easy to organize
movement ofpassengers and good from place to place without waste of time
and without inconvenience. Lal Bahadur succeeded in this to a large extent.
There were four classes- first, second, intermediate and third in the railways
then. First class compartments offered extreme luxury and were almost
heavenly.But the discomfort ofpassengers in the third class compartments
was beyond description. They did not have even minimum comforts. Lal
Bahadur's efforts to reduce the vast disparitybetween the first and the last
classes cannot be forgotten. The first class that offered royal comfort was
abolished. The old second came to be known as the first class and the
intermediate class as the second class. His idea was to have only two classes
of compartments in course of time - the first and the second. It was he who
provided more facilities to travelers in third class compartments. It was
during his time that fans were provided in the third class compartments. He
also worked hard to improve the administration of Railways and to eliminate
thefts in the trains.
Lal Bahadur identified himself with the Railways so much that he felt he was
responsible if anything went wrong in his department. When he was the
Railway Minister in 1956, 144 passengers died in an accident that took place
39
near Ariyalur in Tamil Nadu. Just three months before this, an accident that
took place near Ariyalur in Tamil Nadu. Just three months before this, an
accident had occurred at Mehboob Nagar in which 112 people died. Lal
Bahadur was in no way responsible for these accidents. Yet he was very
much pained. He felt he could not escape the moral responsibility for them.
He had submitted his resignation letter to Pandit Nehru when the Mehboob
Nagar accident took place. But Nehru had not accepted it. But when the
Ariyalur accident took place Shastriji said, 'I must do penance for this. Let me
go.' So strong was his sense of responsibility.
Lal Bahadur Shastri's exit from the Central Cabinet was a blessing for the
ruling party. He worked for the party during the General Elections next year.
Then he became the Minister for Transport andCommunications and later the
Minister for Commerce and Industry. He became the Home Minister in 1961,
after the death of Govind Vallabh Pant.
People used to call him the homeless Home Minister because he did not have
a house of his own. He had rented a small house in Allahabad. Even when he
was a minister, he used to stay in that house when he went to Allahabad.
After a few days the owner of the house let it out to another family. When
Shastriji resigned as minister he vacated the government quarters and he
did not have a place to line in!
The greatest danger that India had to face at the time was China's
aggression (1962). The Chinese army crossed the Himalayan border and
moved forward in wave after wave and occupied Indian territory in the north.
But India stood up like one man against China. The Chinese moved back. But
they did not return the areas they had occupied. China stabbed India in the
back and lost the friendship of India.
This was the time when China in the north and Pakistan both in the east and
the west started giving trouble to India. It was absolutely necessary that the
people of India should forget internal quarrels and that they should unite like
brothers and sisters. Lal Bahadur Shastri strove hard to make the people feel
that they were all one.
40
The ruling Congress Party elected Lal Bahadur unanimously as its leader. He
did not show any interest in the discussions before the election of the leader.
He remained aloof as if it had nothing to do with him. The detachment he
showed then was surprising.
Lal Bahadur Shastri was the Prime Minister of India at a crucial time in India's
history. He was physically weak, but he faced the problems confronting the
nation like a hero. The first problem that he had to face after he became the
Prime Minister was one caused by Pakistan. Pakistan took shape by eroding
India's land, and was instigating Indian Muslims. After the Chinese
aggression, when India's confidence in her strength had been shaken,
Pakistan was creating trouble along the borders.
But Shastriji would not yield to the wickedness of Pakistan. He first tried to
earn the goodwill and support of other nations for India. He visited Russia,
Egypt, Canada and Britain and explained to the leaders of those nations
India's stand. He attended a meeting of the non-aligned nations (nations
which were neutral) and explained India's position. He even tried to reason
with President Ayub Khan of Pakisthan. The wicked do not like advice. They
can understand only one language, the language of war.
It had become Pakistan's habit to provoke India somehow and jump to arms.
Pakisthan had been waiting to swallow Kashmir somehow. She pushed her
forces across the eastern border into the Rann of kuch in Gujarat State in
41
April-May of 1965. Lal Bahadur was not unnerved by this unexpected attack.
He faced the problem with great tact at that critical moment. The Indian
Army forced the attackers to retreat. Then both countries agreed to stop
fighting
But friendly words cannot tame a serpent. There is but one way to do it - to
remove the serpent's fangs.
Even before the ink with which they had signed the Kutch agreement dried
up, Pakisthan raised its hood to strike again. Pakistani soldiers entered
Kashmir in disguise. In September 1965 there was a large-scale invasion of
the territory by Pakistani soldiers in the Chhamb area. War broke out all
along the Cease-fire Line on the Kashmir border.
The enemies who had managed to enter Kashmir were cunning and
mischievous. Pakistan also tried to incite Indian Muslims. The Pakisthan army
was engaged in forcibly occupying areas, which belonged to India. There was
the danger of the fighting spreading to the eastern border also. In addition to
this, there was the threat posed by the Chinese on the northern borders of
India. Lal Bahadur Shastri faced all these problems with a will of iron. It was
at this time that the country understood the greatness of Lal Bahadur
Shastri. He decided that was the time to teach Pakistan a lesson. He gave full
freedom to the Commander of the Army. 'Go forward and strike' was
Shastriji's command to the generals.
At that moment India was fighting against the Pakistani army equipped with
the latest weapons supplied in plety by the United States of America. And, at
this very moment how was India to resist China?
Even the big nations waited breathlessly to see what Lal Bahadur would say
and what India would do.
Lal Bahadur did not take long to give a reply. The letter from China was
received on the morning of 17th September 1965. He made a statement in
the Parliament the same afternoon. He declared: "China's allegation is
untrue. If China attacks India it is our firm resolve to fight for our freedom.
The might of China will not deter us from defending our territorial integrity."
India's soldiers had no fear of death and fought most splendidly and
heroically. The army and the air force functioned like the two arms of a single
body. The invaders were beaten. The Pakistani army could not stand against
the Indian army. It was then that, for the first time, the world came to realize
the supremacy of the Indian army.
Some big nations feared that, if India won a total victory over Pakistan, it
would lower their prestige. The Security Council of the United Nations
Organization called on India and Pakistan to stop fighting.
43
Many people in India felt that we should not return the territory taken from
Pakistan- occupied Kashmir. They argued that the entire Kashmir belonged to
India. But Shastriji wished to give one more chance to Pakistan to live in
peace and friendship with India. So he signed the treaty of friendship.
Shastriji had suffered heart attacks twice before. And during the period of the
Pakistan war and the following days, his body, already battered, had to bear
a very heavy strain. He signed the joint Declaration on 10th January 1966.
He died the same night.
The news of Lal Bahadur Shastri's death struck India like a bolt from the blue.
The entire nation was plunged in grief. Some people suspected foulplay also.
Gone was the war hero and the messenger of peace, gone was the great
statesman who restored to India her honor and self- respect in the assembly
of nations. A tiny, tidy figure. A soul that had lived in perfect purity of
thought, word and deed. The very embodiment of selflessness, detachment
and simplicity. Such was this man who had lived in our midst. He belongs to
the race of the heroes of India.
Former Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri's son has demanded that the
government should unravel the mystery shrouding his father's death.
44
Raising doubts about the dark blue spots and cut marks on the abdomen of
his father's body after his death in 1966,Shastri's son Sunil asked, When the
postmortem was not conducted, then how the cut marks appeared?
The government should clear all doubts about my father's death, he said at
a club function here.
After Shastri's death in Tashkent, USSR, on January 11, 1966 soon after
signing the Tashkent Pact with Pakistan, his wife Lalita had alleged he was
poisoned.
A query was later posed by Anuj Dhar, author of CIA's Eye on South Asia,
under the Right to Information Act about his death but the government had
refused to part with classified information on the issue.
The Prime Minister's Office, while refusing information under the RTI Act on
the cause and circumstances of Shastri's death, had said revealing these
details could harm India's foreign relations and would violate Parliamentary
Privilege.
The Russian butler attending on Shastri at the time of his death was arrested
for suspected poisoning but released later.
Prime Minister's address at the inauguration of centenary year
celebrations of late Shri Lal Bahadur Shastri
45
October 2, 2004
New Delhi
Hindi Version
Respected Soniaji, Atalji, Gujralji, Jaipal ji
Friends,
46
It is worth recalling that like many amongst his generation, Shastriji also
gave up his studies to join the freedom struggle in response to Gandhijis call
to strengthen the non-cooperation movement. He was arrested for the first
time at the age of seventeen, and again, like many of the stalwarts of our
independence movement, prison was to become a second home. All told,
Shastriji was sent to prison seven times, spending as many as nine long
years in various prisons.
Despite his involvement in the freedom struggle, following the noncooperation movement, Shri Lal Bahadur resumed and completed his studies
at the Kashi Vidya Peeth. He was awarded the degree of "Shastri" in
philosophy and the humanities, and this was the reason for the public at
large to address him as "Shastriji". Those were also the years in which he
joined the Servants of India society, which burnished his image as a man of
simple habits, great commitment, diligence and sincerity. Shastriji was to
participate in many landmark events of our freedom struggle, including the
salt satyagraha and the Quit India movement. His organizational skills were
noticed at an early stage. In an early recognition of his abilities, Shastriji was
appointed as the Organizing Secretary of the Parliamentary Board of UP in
1937.
Shastrijis first Ministerial term was as Railways and Transport Minister in the
Union Cabinet in 1952. He worked to improve the functioning of the railways,
guiding their transition out of the colonial era. Today, many of the younger
generation may not be aware of these efforts, but most would have heard of
Shastrijis resignation from the Ministerial post, taking moral responsibility for
a major accident. In a tribute to his convictions, Panditji was to say that "no
47
man can wish for a better comrade and better colleague in any undertaking".
Despite this setback, Shastriji was to hold several other important portfolios
in Panditjis cabinet, including the portfolios of Transport and
Communications, Commerce and the Home Ministry.
best way for us to pay tribute to the memory of patriots like Shastriji is for us
to live by the principles they cherished, of service to the Nation and pursuit
of truth, with firm resolve, simple living and high thinking.
I would like to conclude with the hope that the National Committee of
eminent persons with which the Government is consulting for activities to
commemorate the centenary of Lal Bahadur Shastri will be able to develop
suitable events to pay a truly fitting tribute to the memory of this great son
of India.
Jai Hind".
It was but natural that people everywhere should mentally compare Mr.
Shastri in his new role to the Pt. Nehru. Many people thought that he may at
best be a competent stop-gap Prime Minister.
But Mr. Shastri suffered from no such inhibitions. He saw his duty clearly.
While maintaining and strengthening he basic framework of national policy
built by his illustrious predecessor, he had to chalk out his course of action
by his own lights. He had enough strength as an individual to see the danger
inherent in trying to be anyone but himself.
Mr. Shastri could not be another Nehru. He was a person in his own right and,
called upon to lead the nation at a particularly difficult time in its history, he
had to do his best. Therefore, he told the people, Nobody can succeed
Nehru; we can only try to carry on his work in a humble way.
Achievements
49
As Prime Minister of India, Mr. Shastri actually got into stride sometime in
October, 1964 when he had sufficiently recovered from a heart-attack which
had kept him largely inactive during the first four months of his stewardship.
The second Non-aligned Nations Summit conference in Cairo was the first
important international meeting which he attended as Indias chosen leader.
While in Cairo, he raised his voice in favor of peace. He had taken the first
opportunity to show that under his leadership, India would continue to be a
force on the side of peace in the world.
The talks with Ceylons Prime Minister, Mrs. Sirimavo Bandaranaike towards
the end of October, 1964, resulted in an agreement that was hailed as a
magnificent achievement of Mr. Shastri as it removed a persistent cause of
unpleasantness between India and Ceylon.
The Indo-Pakistan war begun in April, 1965. The war continued till
September, 1965.
When Pakistan launched the invasion of Kashmir, he hit back hard. His call
galvanized the whole nation to rise as one man to meet the challenge. Thus
50
this man of peace was forced to lead his people into a fierce conflict for
preserving Indias honor and sovereignty.
His inspiring words infused new life into the people, and heartened Indias
brave army. Against superior equipment and heavy odds, the Indian soldiers,
airmen and sailors gave a glorious account of their courage and prowess.
The countless deeds of unparalleled heroism performed by the jawans during
the time of war were enough to make every Indian feel proud of belonging to
this country. The nation gained a new confidence in itself. Even though the
conflict lasted for a few weeks only, it served to show India how she stood
vis--vis other nations.
Even though the Indian Army scored victories, but the destruction and
bloodshed made his heart bleed, and in keeping with the honor of the
motherland, he bent his energies towards bringing the conflict to a close.
After cease-fire, while mentioning those who had lost their lives on the
battle-field, he broke down. That was indicative of the anguish which he must
have undergone while the conflict lasted. But in spite of it, he did not spare
himself in his relentless quest for peace.
Tashkent Declaration
51
Death
Estimate: Mr. Shastri held charge of the country for a brief period of 18
months. Even during this period he made to the countrys heritage a
contribution which can compare with the best in its richness and variety. He
not only preserved but also strengthened the legacy of Gandhi and Nehru.
His composed calmness in the midst of turmoil and excitement, and his cool
determination showed his countrymen where their strength lay. In fact, these
were the qualities which enabled him to grapple with the multifarious
problems which confronted the country at the time he was called upon to
wear the mantle of the Late Pt. Nehru. The world has acknowledged that he
wore it well.
Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri was born on the same date in 1904.
Shashtriji was an ardent follower of Mahatma Gandhi and his principles. It
was Mahatma Gandhi who drew Shastrijis attention to Indias independent
movement.
Lal Bahadur Shashtri believed in Nehruvian economic policies and hence he
was made the Prime Minister after the death of Jawaharlal Nehru in 1964.
There are lot of episodes and things that one would like to know about
Shashtriji. We take a look at them here:
1. Lal Bahadur Shastri was born in Ramnagar in Varanasi in a Kayastha
family, but as Shastriji didnt believe in caste discrimination, dropped his
tittle. Later, when he graduated at Kashi Vidyapeeth, he was given the title
of Shashtri (scholar).
2. Lal Bahadur Shastris fondness for Mahatma Gandhi is well known. Not
many know that Shashtri was also influenced by Bal Gangadhar (Lokmanya)
Tilak in his early days.
3. In 1921, when Mahatma Gandhi call for youth to come out of schools and
colleges and join the Non-Cooperation movement, Shahstri paid heed to that
call. This also marked Shashtris first move/contribution towards Indias
freedom.
53
8. Another little known fact about Lal Bahadur Shastri is that it was him who
ordered using jets of water instead of lathis to disperse the crowd; during his
charge as a minister of Police Department.
15. Lal Bahadur Shastri coined the phrase Jai Jawaan Jai Kisaan (Hail soldier,
Hail Farmer) to enthuse the moral, during Indias successful war against
Pakistan in 1965.
16. Lal Bahdaur Shastris leadership was hailed across the globe when he led
India to victory in the Indo-Pak war of 1965.
17. Lal Bahadur Shashtri died due to cardiac arrest under suspicious
circumstances in Tashkent, giving rise to reports of a deep-rooted conspiracy.
India acquired independence on 15 August 1947 though sections of the
country were carved out and stitched together to create another new
country, Pakistan. The institutional road to independence was perhaps laid
down by the Government of India Act of 1935, where the gradual emergence
of India as a self-governing entity had first been partly envisioned. Following
India's independence in 1947, the Constituent Assembly deliberated over the
precise constitutional future of India. On 26 January 1950, India became a
Republic, and the Constitution of India was promulgated. Jawaharlal Nehru
had become the countrys first Prime Minister in 1947, and in 1952, in the
countrys first general election with a universal franchise, Nehru led the
Indian National Congress to a clear victory. The Congress had long been the
principal political party in India, providing the leadership to the struggle for
independence, and under Nehrus stewardship it remained the largest and
most influential party over the next three decades. In 1957, Nehru was
elected to yet another five-year term as a member of the Lok Sabha and
chosen to head the government. His regime was marked by the advent of
five-year plans, designed to bring big science and industry to India; in
Nehru's own language, steel mills and dams were to be the temples of
modern India. Relations with Pakistan remained chilling, and the purported
friendship of India and China proved to be something of a hoax. Chinas
invasion of India's borders in 1962 is said to have dealt a mortal blow to
Nehru.
Nehru was succeeded at his death on 27 May 1964 for a period of two weeks
by Gulzarilal Nanda (1898-1998), a veteran Congress politician who became
active in the non-cooperation movement in 1922 and served several prison
terms, principally in 1932 and from 1942-44 during the Quit India movement.
55
Nanda served as acting Prime Minister until the Congress had elected a new
leader, Lal Bahadur Shastri, also a veteran politician who came of age during
the Gandhi-led non-cooperation movement. Shastri was the compromise
candidate who, perhaps unexpectedly, led the country to something of a
victory over Pakistan in 1965. Shastri and the vanquished Pakistani
President, Muhammad Ayub Khan, signed a peace treaty at Tashkent in the
former Soviet Union on 10 January 1966, but Shastri barely lived to witness
the accolades that were now being showered upon him since he died of an
heart attack the day after the treaty was signed. Shastris empathy for the
subaltern classes is conveyed through the slogan, Jai Jawan, Jai Kisan, Hail
the Soldier, Hail the Farmer, which is attributed to him and through which
he is remembered at Vijay Ghat, the national memorial to him in New Delhi
in the proximity of Rajghat, the national memorial to Mohandas Gandhi.
sought to avenge the destruction unleashed upon the Golden Temple, the
venerable shrine of the Sikh faith, by Indian government troops given the
task of flushing out the terrorists holed in the shrine, she was succeeded by
her son, Rajiv Gandhi, in late 1984.
In the December 1994 Lok Sabha elections, Rajiv Gandhi and the Congress
party won a landslide election. But Rajivs premiership was to be marked by
numerous political disasters, and Rajivs own name was tainted by the
allegation that he had received huge bribes from a Swedish firm of Bofors,
manufacturers of a machine-gun for which the Indian army placed a large
order. His own finance minister, V. P. Singh (1931-), once a Indira Gandhi
loyalist who had been picked by her in 1980 to serve as the Chief Minister of
Uttar Pradesh, was to turn against Rajiv; and in 1989, V. P. Singh led the
Janata Party to an electoral rout over the Congress. However, the revived
Janata party mustered only 145 votes, and it had to take the support of the
Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), led by L. K. Advani and Atal Behari Vajpayee, in
order to form a government. It is at this juncture that India truly entered the
era of coalition governments. V. P. Singh would soon be brought down by two
disputes: one over the status of the Babri Masjid, a sixteenth-century
mosque that Hindu militants claimed had been built over the Ram
Janmasthan [birthplace], and the second over the recommendations of the
Mandal commission pertaining to quotas for various elements of Indias
underprivileged masses. On 7 November 1990, by a vote of 356-151, V. P.
Singh lost the confidence of the Lok Sabha, and some days later Chandra
Sekhar (1927-), with the support of Rajiv Gandhis Congress, was sworn in as
the next prime minister. However, Congress withdrew its support in March
1991, and elections were called in May.
But Gujrals government similarly lasted less than a year; and in the general
elections of February 1998, the BJP emerged again as the single largest
party, this time with 200 seats. Vajpayee was invited to form a government,
and did so with a coalition of several parties, including the AIADMK, led by
Jayalalitha. Nothing that the BJP did was so ripe with consequences as the
decision to turn India into a nuclear state with a series of nuclear tests in
May 1998. The coalition, not unpredictably, broke down; but the general
elections of September 1999, in which the BJP again emerged as the single
largest party, and the Congress had a poor showing at the polls, despite
being led by Sonia Gandhi, a scion of the Nehru dynasty, were to reinforce
the impression that regional parties and politics have fundamentally altered
the state of Indian politics. Under Vajpayee, the BJP presided over the
countrys destiny until 2004, even though it was becoming inescapably clear
that the dominance of any one party is no longer a foregone conclusion and
that coalition politics appears to be the way of the future. Many
commentators were rightfully alarmed by various ominous developments
that transpired during the BJPs years in office, such as the coercive
Hinduization of the country, the inability of the state to guarantee the rights
of religious minorities, and other obvious manifestations of an utter disregard
for human rights, such as state-sponsored killings in Kashmir, the north-east,
and elsewhere, or the oppressions unleashed upon Christians and women.
On the other hand, Vajpayee and the BJP are not only credited with having
administered a crushing blow to Pakistans adventurism on the Himalayan
58
In provincial elections held in several states in late 2003, the BJP registered
impressive triumphs and the party leadership was led into thinking that, in
calling for early elections, it could consolidate its gains with a magisterial
showing in national elections. The BJP waged a campaign on the slogan of
India Shining, trumpeting the emergence of India as a major power.
However, the Indian electorate once again showed that it was not to be
taken for granted, and the BJP and its allies lost to a coalition headed by the
Congress party. [See Indias Moment: Elections 2004.] The Fourteenth Lok
Sabha convened on 17 May 2004 and Manmohan Singh (1932-) assumed the
office of the Prime Minister at the head of what is known as the UPA (United
Progressive Alliance) government. The UPA is supported by the Left Front, a
coalition of parties headed by the CPM, or the Communist Party of India
(Marxist).
The partition of India is a signal event in world history, not merely in the
history of the Indian subcontinent. British rule became established in eastern
India around the mid-eighteenth century, and by the early part of the
nineteenth century, the British had tightened their grip over considerable
portions of the country. The suppression of the Indian revolt of 1857-58
ushered in a period, which would last ninety years, when India was directly
under Crown rule. Communal tensions heightened in this period, especially
with the rise of nationalism in the early 20th century. Though the Indian
National Congress, the premier body of nationalist opinion, was ecumenical
and widely representative in some respects, Indian Muslims were
encouraged, initially by the British, to forge a distinct political and cultural
identity. The Muslim League arose as an organization intended to enhance
the various -- political, cultural, social, economic, and religious -- interests of
the Muslims.
The bulk of the scholarly literature on the partition has focussed on the
political processes that led to the vivisection of India, the creation of
Pakistan, and the "accompanying" violence. Numerous people have
attempted to establish who the "guilty" parties might have been, and how far
communal thinking had made inroads into secular organizations and
59
In recent years, the scholarly literature has taken a different turn, becoming
at once more nuanced as well as attentive to considerations previously
ignored or minimized. There is greater awareness, for instance, of the
manner in which women were affected by the partition and its violence, and
the scholarship of several women scholars and writers in particular has
focussed on the abduction of women, the agreements forged between the
Governments of India and Pakistan for the recovery of these women, and the
underlying assumptions -- that women could scarcely speak for themselves,
that they constituted a form of exchange between men and states, that the
honor and dignity of the nation was invested in its women, among others -behind these arrangements. Earlier generations of scholars hardly bothered
with oral histories, but lately there have been a number of endeavors to
collect oral accounts, not only from victims but on occasion even from
60
There was a time, not long ago, when scarcely any attention was paid to the
partition. Perhaps some forms of violence and trauma are better forgotten:
the partition had no institutional sanction, unlike many of the genocides of
the twentieth century, and the states of Pakistan and India cannot be held
accountable in the same way in which one holds Germany accountable for
the elimination of Europes Jews or Soviet Russia accountable for the death of
millions of peasants in the name of modernization and development. It is
also possible to argue that the partition theme gets displaced onto other
forms of expression. But it can scarcely be denied that now, more than ever,
it ha has become necessary to adopt several different approaches to the
partition, taking up not only the questions covered in the more conventional
historical literature -- the events leading up to the partition, the ideology
(indeed pathology) of communalism, and the immediate political
consequences of the partition -- but also the insights offered by film,
literature, memoirs, and contemporary political and cultural commentary. Of
course, the consequences of partition are there to be seen: India and
Pakistan continue to be embroiled in conflict, and Kashmir remains a point of
contention between them. The psychic wounds of partition are less easily
observed, and we have barely begun to fathom the myriad ways in which
partition has altered the civilizational histories of South Asia. If the partition
appeared to some to vindicate the idea of the nation-state, to others the
partition might well represent the low point of the nation-state ideology. Will
the people of South Asia ever leave behind their partitioned selves?
Democracies everywhere, but perhaps nowhere more so than in India,
present a complex scenario of tensions between constraints and liberty,
unfreedom and freedom, the imperatives of the modern national security
state and the aspirations of a free citizenry. The very fact that India has
repeatedly been able to mount general elections since it gained its freedom
61
from British rule in 1947, and on a scale never before witnessed in history, is
adduced as evidence of the strength of Indian democracy -- an
accomplishment that seems all the more remarkable given the precarious
state of democracy in most of the world. Indeed, assumptions about the
robustness of democracy in India always take as their implied referent the
contrast that comes to mind with Pakistan and many other states in the
global South. Pakistan has been under military rulers for 32 of its sixty years
of its existence, and even its civilian rulers have always governed with the
apprehension that a coup might summarily remove them from office as the
constant tussle between Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif, each removed
from office more than once to pave the way for the other, amply suggests.
[See also on MANAS, Pakistan: A Select Political Chronology, 1947-2008.] In
Africa, democratic states have had at least as fragile an existence, and
military dictatorships, despotisms, and authoritarian democracies have
indisputably been the norm.
So just what is it that accounts for the resilience and endurance of Indian
democracy? Why has it flourished in India when it has failed in other states?
And why has it done so even though Indias mass poverty, widespread
illiteracy, slow economic growth, a large bureaucracy clearly indifferent to
norms of efficiency, a culture of permissive corruption, and unrivaled
heterogeneity were all, according to classical accounts, supposed to militate
against the growth of democracy? The rhetoric of the state was
redistributive, but in practice substantial redistribution was abandoned.
Some considerations quickly come to mind, and are offered here as an aid to
rumination, and with the hope that researchers will find these suggestions of
sufficient intellectual interest to pursue them at greater length:
1. The Congress, for all its authoritarian tendencies and its close
identification with the Nehru-Gandhi family, furnished a considerable
element of stability. In 1985, the Congress completed 100 years of its
existence, and only a few Western democracies have had political parties
which have similarly stood the test of time. To be sure, the Congress of Indira
Gandhi, and even more so of contemporary times, may not bear much of a
62
resemblance with the Indian National Congress during the time of Beasant,
Tilak, Gandhi and later, but nonetheless the very presence of the Congress
signifies certain continuities.
2. India had, from the colonial period, a relatively centralized state and, at
the same time, some machinery for local elections and political
representation. Though center-state relations have not been without deep
difficulties, India has achieved a not insignificant balance between
Federal/center and the states. The creation of linguistic states was in itself an
important accommodation in this regard. It is important to issue a caveat
here about supposing that the colonial legacy was all-important: the British
in India, for example, resisted universal franchise, and only after
independence did this become a reality.
3. India inherited and retained a well-oiled civil service. India had what is
called a bourgeois revolution; the demand for Pakistan, by contrast, was
led by landed aristocrats. This might also explain why land reforms have
been less far-reaching in Pakistan and why that country is still said to be
governed more by feudal norms.
5. India retained civil society & state institutions that have provided stability.
Two that come to mind are the Supreme Court and the Electoral Commission.
The same Supreme Court that sentenced Mohammed Afzal to death,
63
8. One should not understate important legislative gains for ordinary people,
including the passage of the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act, the
Forest Peoples Land Rights Bill, the Right to Information Act, and the
Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act. One can argue this even
while conceding that progressive legislation, for example on the practice of
dowry, can coexist alongside a resolute determination to prevent its
implementation. The law can obfuscate problems as much as it can help to
relieve them, an outcome all but assured when the state has no substantive
commitment to the idea of an open society and distributive equality. One can
also identify other problems with such legislation: it has been said that
something like 90 percent of the requests filed under the Right to
Information Act emanate from institutions and employees of the state, and
more often than not such interests stem from nothing more substantial than
the attempt of an employee to find out the salaries of other employees.
Ultimately, however, arguments against legislation that in principle is
progressive are not easily sustained.
9. In the wisdom of the Indian people is the first source of Indias renewal.
Time after time the illiterate electorates of India have shown better judgment
64
than the educated. The poor are more committed to the ballot box in India
than the elites; in the modern West, such as the US, it is the other way
around. The ruling party was thrown out in 1977, 1980, and in several
elections since then, including the election of 2004.
11. Though Mohandas Gandhis assassins never seem to rest, the spectre of
Gandhi remains to haunt, guide, and inspire Indians who are resistant to
everything that passes for normal politics and have not entirely succumbed
to the oppressions of modernity. As I have elsewhere written, Gandhi took
great risks and was not in the least cowed down by history, the sanctity of
traditions, or scriptural authority. There is something ineffable in all this; the
place of Gandhis long shadowy presence in politics is hard to document.
13. The intellectual class in India comprised not merely of academics, but
of writers, filmmakers, public intellectuals, and others -- survived the
onslaught of colonialism better than did intellectual classes in most other
colonized societies. It may have to do, in part, with the insularity,
secretiveness, and esotericism of Brahmin life and networks.
65
14. Hinduism itself, I suspect, has facilitated the pluralist nature of the Indian
polity. The attempt has been to turn Hindus into the proper religious subjects
of a proper nation-state, but the fundamental anarchy of Hinduism resists
such attempt. On the other hand, one can argue that the caste system is
intrinsically hierarchical and oppressive. This subject needs much further
inquiry.
15. The cultural and intellectual project of achieving the nation-state was
taken rather seriously in India from the outset of independence, taking a leaf
here from colonialisms epistemological projects. Let us think of state
institutions such as the Akademis (Sahitya, Lalit Kala, Sangeet Natak), the
ICHR, the state-sponsored histories, and so on; on the other hand, let us not
forget the place of Hindi-language cinema. (This is also quite clearly seen in
the Indian diaspora.)
There are certain moments in the cultural and political life of a nation when
the national flag comes into prominence. Every Indian is aware that the
Prime Minister unfurls the national tricolor from the ramparts of the Red Fort
every Independence Day on August 15, and indeed the observance of
January 26th as Republic Day goes back to 31 December 1929, when
Jawaharlal Nehru hoisted the flag of the Indian National Congress, gave a call
for purna swaraj, and asked people to observe January 26 as independence
day. Most recently, the cremation of Beant Singh reminded us that the
honored dead are honored with the flag, and that if the national flag is
attendant upon the birth of a nation, it equally accompanies in death those
whose lives are construed as being symbolic of the nation.
Along with the national anthem, the national flag is supremely and specially
iconic of the nation-state. It is understood that the honor and integrity of the
nation are captured by the flag, and as the history of every country shows,
the national flag is uniquely capable of enlisting the aid of citizens, giving
rise to sentiments of nationalism, and evoking the supreme sacrifice of
death: in every respect, the national flag commands, not merely our respect,
but our allegiance. Thus it is that last year, when the then Miss Universe,
Sushmita Sen, was taken on a triumphant parade through the streets of
Delhi, the manner in which her carriage displayed the national flag was
found to be offensive. Attached to the back of her carriage, in direct defiance
of the regulations stipulated in the Flag Code-India, the national flag
appeared to have been compromised and demeaned; indeed, it appeared as
though Sushmita Sen had rendered it into an item of consumption. Though
Sen could, under the laws of the land, have faced fines and imprisonment,
her own iconic significance, as the reigning beauty queen of the world, and
as a supposed paean to the glory of modern Indian womanhood, was
scarcely to be underestimated, and was shown at that moment to be hardly
less than the iconic significance attached to the flag.
67
The flag has once again come into the news. In a highly significant ruling on
September 21st, the Delhi High Court directed that the Flag Code-India,
which governs the use and display of the National Flag, could not be so
interpreted as to prevent an ordinary citizen of India from flying in a
respectful manner the National Flag from the premises of his or her business
or residence. In any case, the Flag Code, ruled the Court, was not to be
construed as law, and its contravention could not be enforced unless, of
course, such contravention came within the purview of either the Emblem
Act or the Prevention of Insult to National Honour Act.
Most Indians can scarcely have been aware that they were forbidden,
apparently under pain of punishment, to fly the national flag from the
premises of their residential or office buildings, and it is just as unlikely that
the proverbial 'man on the street' will view the judgment of the Delhi High
Court as of any consequence to him. But this is no small victory for the
Indian citizen, when we consider that a very significant chapter of the history
of the independence movement was woven around the hard-won struggle of
Indians to fly the flag of their choice. The present flag is, to a considerable
degree and certainly in essence, the flag to whose design none other than
Mahatma Gandhi lent his hand, and which the Congress was to adopt in
1921. Writing for Young India on 13 April 1921, two years after the massacre
at Jallianwala Bagh, Gandhi observed that the red in the flag represented
Hindus, the green stood for Muslims, and that the white represented all other
faiths; the spinning wheel in the middle of the flag pointed to the oppressed
condition of every Indian, just as it evoked the possibility of rejuvenating
every Indian household. Gandhi did not think that the matter of the national
flag trifling; as he was to put it, "A flag is a necessity for all nations. Millions
have died for it. It is no doubt a kind of idolatry which it would be a sin to
destroy." If the Union Jack could evoke immeasurably strong sentiments in
English breasts, was it not necessary that all Indians "recognize a common
flag to live and to die for"?
the capital of Asoka's Sarnath Pillar for the charkha, for the National Flag
chosen by the Constituent Assembly in July 1947. In the meantime, between
1921 and 1947, a war of attrition developed between Indian nationalists and
government officials over the right to fly the Gandhi or Congress flag. Indian
nationalists found that hoisting the flag invariably attracted the wrath, and
often the vengeance, of British officials, and usually the flag was ordered to
be brought down. Only once, at Bhagalpur in 1923, did the district official
assent to a rare compromise, when he consented to have the Congress flag
flown alongside the Union Jack, albeit at a lower height! This invited the
reprimand of the Government of India and the British Cabinet, who wished to
make it clear "that in no circumstances should the Swaraj or Gandhi Flag be
flown in conjunction with even below the Union Jack." The more usual
response was to have men and boys who defiantly carried the Congress Flag
whipped, and during the civil disobedience movement of 1930-33, boys as
young as 8 years old were given 10-30 stripes each for this purported
offense. A six-month long "Flag Satyagraha" in Nagpur in 1923, in which a
good part of the national leadership participated, led to the withdrawal of
prohibitory orders on the use of the Congress Flag.
Thus, when we consider the arduous effort with which Indians established
their right to fly their flag, it is all the more extraordinary, disturbing, and
deplorable that, in independent India, the state should have arrogated this
right to itself and turned it into a privilege. It is fitting that the judiciary
should now have restored this fundamental right to Indian citizens. However,
as in all matters, the ruling of the Delhi High Court cannot be construed
simply as a cause for celebration. All too often, the national flag in most
countries has been the pivot around which sentiments not merely of
nationalism but of jingoism, hatred, and racial exclusivism have been
fostered, a most telling example of which was the war against Iraq in 1991,
when Americans, most of whom (the 'educated' not excepted) were unable
to locate Iraq on a map, foolishly huddled around their flag. In some other
countries, again most notably the United States, an offensive and
extravagant patriotic sensibility leads the public to an indiscriminate and
excessive display of the flag even during times of peace. One can only hope
that Indians will prevail upon themselves to display a more judicious and
restrained attitude towards the flag. There may also well be a time, in the
very near future, when the Indian parliament and judiciary will have to
deliberate in an altogether different manner on the status of the flag. Is the
69
Buddhist texts commonly tell a story where a holy man (sometimes the
Buddha himself), seated at a crossroads, is faced with a difficult decision.
The holy man sees a man run by him; momentarily later, another man, or
group of men, come running by, and inquire of him if he knows which road
the first man has taken. In the interpretive traditions surrounding this story,
the holy man or the Buddha is faced with an intersecting array of
considerations, and at least three choices are evidently available to him. He
can choose to tell the truth, with the possible consequence of endangering
the life of the man who ran by him; he can choose to tell a lie, and perhaps
save the life of this man, but at the price of violating an indispensable
injunction of the ethical life, the obligation to remain bound by the truth; or
he can choose to remain silent. This parable speaks to us about the
difficulties of adhering to the life of truth, about the conflicting
interpretations of truth and falsehood, and about the virtues of stillness and
equanimity; it also says something about energy, and about the dialectic of
rest and motion; and yet again we can also read it as a homily on the
contigent nature of all systems of knowledge, on the ambiguous necessity of
choosing between interpretations, and on the difficulties of deriving the
meaning of meaning itself.
Whatever the holy man's eventual choice, the compilers of the Guinness
Book of Records appear to have had no difficulty in locating the meaning of
another story involving a seated man. For the last few years, the Guinness
Book has accredited an Indian holy man with the world record for remaining
seated for the longest period of time. The entry notes that "the silent Indian
fakir Mastram Bapu ('contented father') remained on the same spot by the
roadside in the village of Chitra for 22 years from 1960-82." It would seem
70
quite logical that this record should be held by an Indian. The fakir has been,
for some centuries, an iconic figure in popular representations of India, and
Westerners have over the years flocked to India to learn something of the
ascetic and meditative practices of Indian holy men. In colonial writings, the
hot climate of India was seen as inducing a stupor in its natives, making
them indolent and averse to a life of action, and a stationary and seated man
would have been the most apposite icon of a static country, impervious to
the passage of time and the attraction of places, where men were quite
content with the simplest of human needs, fulfilled with a minimal
expenditure of energy. By the twin processes of condensation and iteration,
this image is then captured in the entry in the Guiness Book, which also
imposes its own categories of knowledge. Thus the editors must have
thought that there was nothing ironic in placing the entry under the caption
"Camping out". Indians know nothing of camping, and the practice of
pitching tents, or placing stakes, in the great outdoors remains a peculiarly
Anglo phenomenon. There is yet a more supreme irony, one that Henry
David Thoreau, who wrote of the world and stayed in the woods around
Walden Pond, would most certainly have relished: in having stayed at one
spot for a good part of his life, Mastram Bapu had nonetheless managed to
arrive, propelling himself into the pages of what the West calls 'history'.
The peculiar achievement of Mastram Bapu is only one of many like stories.
News bits about Indians finding a place in the Guinness Book of Records have
become staple items in Indian newspapers, whether published in India or
abroad, over the last few years. Though Indians hold only a small fraction of
the thousands of records of human achievement, endurance, prowess,
ingenuity, and foibles, lavish attention is bestowed by Indian print and visual
media upon each Indian triumph, and there is every indication that Indians
today are scrambling, with resounding success, to have their names etched,
in howsoever bizarre a manner, in the annals of fame. Most of the records for
which Indians are included in the Guinness Book were set in the last five
years, in the immediate aftermath of the Rajiv Gandhi 'era', and according to
the London headquarters of the Guinness Book, at least one tenth of all mail
they receive is from India, mainly from people seeking to receive
acknowledgment of some record that they have set. Indians who have been
admitted into the pages of the Guinness Book also belong to the World
Record Holder Club of India, and reportedly the President of this club
changed his name from Harparkash Rishi to Guinness Rishi. What explains
71
the compulsion Indians apparently feel to find a place in the Guinness Book?
Must one point to fragile egos and a feeling of inferiority in comparison to
Anglo-Saxon culture, or can one evoke, as has one writer, the notion of a
fetish for records? Or is there perhaps, in the narrative of Indians'
enchantment with achieving records, something that can be inferred about
the manner in which configurations of masculinity, femininity, eccentricity,
competitiveness, sportsmanship, and 'Indianness', all shaped by the
experience of colonialism and modernity, have contributed to the shaping of
contemporary Indian middle-class public culture?
While these records are to most people a matter of some curiosity, they
would also appear to be nothing short of trivia. The authors of recent
assaults upon the 'canon', while denouncing with good reasons the grand
narratives of Enlightenment rationality, or questioning the place of
foundational categories in interpretive critical theory, or -- less subtly -substituting the works of women and men of color for the writings of white
males grounded largely if not exclusively in European traditions of inquiry
and intellectual practices, have nonetheless retained a fairly conventional
sense of what constitutes 'material' for the purposes of intellectual inquiry
and political argumentation. The place of gossip, rumors, and anecodotes in
the construction of narratives, and in the creation of a cultural politics of
resistance, is beginning to be explored, and in allowing the Guinness Book to
be a refracting medium, particularly for certain positions on modernity, I am
doing no more than extending the meaning of the 'canon'. Let us recall that
the word canon, which has an extraordinarily rich history, largely forgotten in
current debates, meant in the first instance a yardstick, standard, rule, or
model; only later did it acquire some other meanings, such as the notion of a
'list', which is indeed one of the meanings inherent in the idea that there
exists a grand canon of literary works. Rules, much like records, exist to be
stretched indeed broken, and there are also, needless to say, rules for
establishing records. If I appear to be enshrining trivia, by constituting the
Guinness Book as my central text, I do so with the encouragement of a not
inconsiderable authority, Walter Benjamin: "Method of this work: literary
montage. I need say nothing. Only show. I won't steal anything valuable or
appropriate any witty turns of phrase. But the trivia, the trash: this, I don't
want to take stock of, but let it come into its own in the only way possible:
use it."
72
To speak of records is, for the most part, to speak of numbers. Take, for
example, the record for needle threading. The 1992 Guinness Book noted
that the record for the number of times that a strand of cotton thread had
been threaded through a number 13 needle (eye 0.5 in. x 0.16 in.) in 2 hours
was 7,238, set by Brajesh Shrivastava on 12 December 1990 in Bhopal, a
city notorious for the record number of dead left behind by a gas leak in a
Union Carbide plant in 1984; however, this record was not to last long, as his
fellow countryman, Om Prakash Singh, a clerk at a bank in Allahabad,
threaded a needle 20,675 times in the same amount of time before a live
audience on 25 July 1993. The former gentleman, having been deprived of
his world record, was to demonstrate his tenacity, and his will to fame, by
the mere expedient of setting a record in an altogether different domain: as
the Guinness Book for 1995 states, Shrivastava holds the record for having
created the largest hand-painted wooden fan, nearly eighteen and a half feet
tall, in the world. Shrivastava, who appears to have nursed lifelong ambitions
to appear in the Guinness Book, first made his way into the Limca Book of
Records, which largely whets the appetites of those Indians who are not
manly, bold, or lucky enough to make it to Guinness' compilation of world
records, but can nonetheless satisfy themselves with the thought that they
hold some record in India, with numerous records for microwriting, such as
writing 61,800 characters, which cannot be read by the naked eye, on threefourth space on one side of a postcard. This sort of record would seem to
appeal to Indians: according to the Guinness Book, the record for "miniscule
writing" is held by Surendra Apharya of Jaipur, who wrote 1,314 characters
on a single grain of rice on 28 February 1991.
If there is, then, a fetish for records, it is in the first instance a propensity
towards numbers. As in any other civilization, numbers have played a fecund
role in the shaping of Indian culture, but it is arguable that the Indian
imagination is particularly drawn to taxonomies, numerology, and the sheer
play to which numbers lend themselves. The Hindu Puranas contain the most
complex concatenations of numbers, and numbers have been critical to such
enterprises as divination, ritual sacrifice, literary compositions, construction
of genealogies, cosmogony, and astrology. The Kama Sutra, the well-known
Indian guide to love-making, is precise about the number of sexual positions
during copulation, and a recent cartoon history of the world mocks this
73
Memory, too, has a hand in this nexus of records, numbers, and statistics,
and what has not been adequately realized, much less studied, is how
numbers function as mnemonic devices. Competitions lasting over days,
even weeks, in which pandits recite entire texts -- such as the Ramayana and
the Bhagvata Purana -- from memory, or recite passages from sacred texts
picked for them randomly, are quite common. It is a similar facility with
memory, and the resort to those mnemonic strategies by which cultures (and
not mere texts) have been preserved and transmitted, that may help to
account for the fact that the most extraordinary "human computer" in the
world today is an Indian, Shakuntala Devi. When she was given two 13-digit
numbers (7,686,369,774,870 and 2,465,099,745,779) to multiply, she did so
accurately within 28 seconds; and she has repeatedly performed such feats.
"Some experts on calculating prodigies refuse to give credence to Mrs. Devi",
states the Guinness Book, "on the grounds that her achievements are so
vastly superior to the calculating feats of any other investigated prodigy that
the authentication must have been defective" (p. 176). It is not an accident
that India is today one of the principal countries for research in statistics, and
that her statisticians are renowned the world over.
74
That those numbers which Hegel and James Mill derided may not have been
without 'meaning', or that they followed a cultural logic impervious to an
instrumental rationality, would not have occurred to European commentators
on Indian culture and 'experts' on Indian knowledge systems. This form of
indulgence in, and engagement with, numbers owed something to what we
might call a cultural cosmology, whereas the present-day obsession with
numbers among many Indians has, in part, a rather different locus. Ian
Hacking, the historian of science, has noted that in the 1830s and 1840s
England was engulfed by a "sheer fetishism for numbers": bodies were
furiously counted, and statistics were accumulated on everything, from
railway mileage and the total number of lashes administered in a year to all
habitual offenders, to the number of drunkards and lunatics contained in
prisons and asylums. Where numbers were at one time an occasion for men
and women to give expression to their ludic tendencies, even rendering
themselves ludicrous, in the nineteenth century numbers acquired a
restraining function. The colonial rulers in India were to follow suit: in the
nineteenth century, the state began to acquire enumerative functions, and
this obsession with statistics, which was to constitute one of the central
features of the colonial sociology of knowledge, was conveyed in such
practices as the census, anthropometry, criminal statistics, and numerous
other classificatory, investigative, disciplinary, and repressive procedures.
This avalanche of numbers was to be described by Foucault as "biopower";
an entire administrative and regulatory machinery, harnessed to the body,
was to come into place. It is useful to recall that the word 'statistics' is
etymologically related to the word 'state'; and statistics would henceforth do
the work of the state.
effective and thorough, avenues for wielding power have been found; and if
India does make its way into the Security Council, to the great delight of its
elites, it shall be a Security Council for whose decisions the United States will
have little or no use. It is the political and economic elite in India who remind
us that India stands third in the strength of its scientific manpower, that it is
a member of the 'Nuclear Club', that its software engineers are feted (and
feared) in Silicon Valley, and that it is the only Third World nation to join a
few of the post-industrial countries as an exporter of satellite and rocket
technology.
Sadly, India is also the country that holds the record for the largest child
labor force in the world, the largest number of illiterates, the largest number
of people suffering from malnutrition, the largest exploited force of tribal
people, and numerous other unsavory matters. However, these gross forms
of exploitation are viewed as deplorably necessary, or as shortcomings of an
earlier era; the elite are prepared to believe that a price has to be paid for
'development', and that some of these problems will disappear over time.
However, what cannot so easily be tolerated, especially when the country is
making a bid to be considered a strong and important member of the world
community, is the shockingly poor performance of Indian sportsmen and
sportswomen. There is no greater lamentation that fills the Indian papers
than the continued inability of India's sporting hopes to haul home a few
trophies and medals, and that humiliation is aggravated when the smallest
nations, which cannot possibly have any pretension to being a major player
in world politics, and which in the view of Indian elites can even less lay
claim to the enormously complex and rich history of a civilizational entity like
India, are shown to have better and more manly athletes. In the last
Olympics, India failed to win a single medal, not even a bronze, and there
was much soul-searching and agonizing in middle-class homes and organs of
middle-class opinion. Politicians were intervening in the conduct of sports, it
was alleged, making it impossible for true sportsmen to flourish: the country
had failed to invest in its sports program, and thus in its youth, and sporting
programs, like everything else in the country, were the victim of corrupt and
nefarious practices. India's youth had never had much of a sporting chance.
Had India's Herculean disaster at the Olympics stood in singular isolation, it
might have been less sinister, but more recent sporting events have only
confirmed that Indian sports and athletics are in a bad way. At the most
recent Asian Games in Hiroshima, where India was competing not only with
76
Japan, China, and South Korea, the sporting giants of the continent, but with
Macau, Turkmenistan, Brunei, Myanmar, and Tajikistan, not countries whose
presence in the mental cartography of most people is overwhelming, India
could only manage to finish eighth in the medal tally. The 4 gold that India
won compared to 137 won by China. Of India's four gold medals, two were
won in tennis, one in kabbadi, a game that is played only in South Asia, and
one in pistol shooting. "A Notch Better, India Still Falls Far Behind" is what
India-West, the principal paper of the Indian community in California, had to
say about India's performance.
The medal for shooting makes one pause. Three weeks earlier, at the
Commonwealth Games, where India's competitors included Britain, Australia,
and Canada, India's small tally of six gold, eleven silver, and seven bronze,
occasioning a remark from one major newspaper that there had been "a lot
of concern over the poor performance of the Indian contingent", included
four medals won by just one sportsman, Jaspal Rana. The subject of India's
poor showing was important enough to merit an editorial, significantly
entitled, "Shooting, the saving grace." One might be forgiven for thinking
that the writer of the editorial is a card-carrying member of that fanatical and
constitutionally-blessed organization known as the National Rifle Association.
It is particularly ironical that India should be winning virtually its only medals
in shooting and weightlifting. Throughout the last one hundred years of
colonial rule, India was governed by the Arms Act, which forbade Indians
from owning arms or weapons. Very few Indians know how to handle a gun;
the vast majority have never even seen one; and those imbecilic debates
that are carried out in the United States over the most trivial measures to
limit gun ownership would be incomprehensible to Indians. In the British
colonial sociology of knowledge, the Indian could not be manly; his
effeminacy was supposedly apparent in his diet, apparel, and behavior, and
his inability to confront the Englishman. In the characterization of Robert
Orme, who penned an essay in 1770 on the "effeminacy of the inhabitants of
Hindustan", an Englishman had merely to brandish a stick and the Indian
would be sent flying. A gun was scarcely to be expected in the hands of an
Indian; nor was the Indian known for flexing his muscles.
77
It appears to matter little to some Indians themselves that the records they
have set exemplify, in minute details, the Orientalist constructions of India.
Speaking of effeminacy, it is notable that the record for needle-threading is
held by an Indian man, in a country where stitching at home is invariably
deemed to be a woman's job. The Guinness Book also notes that the record
for "the longest duration in a typing marathon on a manual machine", 142
hours 50 minutes, was set by an Indian man from 25-31 July 1990: he hit
916,000 strokes. Perseverance at a typewriter is scarcely the most
persuasive demonstration of manliness, or of the ability of Indians to excel,
or be taken seriously as a modernizing people, and in India, as women
continue to join the work force in large numbers, jobs requiring typing are
almost exclusively the preserve of women. It is perfectly apposite that the
record for miniscule writing and letter-writing should be held by Indians:
writing was construed by India's colonizers as something quite feminine, the
task of men being to rule, govern, and administer. (India's colonial rulers did
leave behind voluminous records and would appear to have displayed a
penchant for the written record: when the men wrote, however, they
78
When the Indian was not seen as lazy, dirty, a lying cheat, and effeminate,
he was construed as being bizarre and eccentric, bound to peculiar customs,
wild in his looks, wholly obsequious to authority. Here, again, Indians whose
names are enshrined in the Guinness Book would appear to endorse this
representation. During a period of 15 months ending on 9 March 1985,
Jagdish Chander crawled 870 miles, apparently "to propitiate his favorite
Hindu goddess, Mata" (p. 526). Students of Indian history might recall that
the notorious General Dyer, perpetrator of the Jallianwala Bagh massacre
and of the even more infamous 'crawling order', which required Indians to
crawl on a particular street where an Englishwoman had been assaulted,
when asked to explain his conduct, replied that some "Indians like to crawl".
It may be poetic justice that the record for the longest continuous crawl is
held by an Englishman, who traversed 28.5 miles in a mere 9.5 hours. To be
eccentric is, literally, to be off-centred, or to be peculiarly balanced: so
showed N. Ravi of Sathyamangalam City, who stood on one foot for a record
34 hours. As the Guinness Book states plainly, "The disengaged foot may not
be rested on the standing foot nor may any object be used for support or
balance" (p. 186). Not to be outdone, his countryman Girish Sharma bettered
this record ten years later by nearly 22 hours. India's yogis and rishis have
long been viewed as capable of the most bizarre or absurd acts, and Swami
Maujgiri Maharaj of Shahjahanpur, Uttar Pradesh, took it upon himself to
engage in the most unusual form of penance by continuously standing for 17
years, thereby establishing a world record that no one is likely to break too
soon. "When sleeping", adds the Guinness Book for the benefit of those left
somewhat mystified, "he would lean against a plank" (p. 186).
79
Numerous other records of this kind are held by Indians. Thus far I have
suggested that the quest for records by Indians must be viewed not only in
relation to their absorption in, and engagement with, numbers but also in
relation to anxieties about masculinity, modernity, and the nation-state. It is
not accidental that virtually all of the records were set in the last ten years,
and most of these in the last five years. In late 1984, following the
assassination of his mother, Rajiv Gandhi had assumed the office of the
Prime Minister of India. Himself a rather young man, quite unlike many of
India's geriatric politicians, Rajiv Gandhi gravitated towards the youth, and
made known his commitment to making India a strong, modern nation-state.
It is perfectly apposite that "Mera Bharat Mahan", which may be read as "My
India is Great", or "May My India Be Great", should have become the slogan
most closely associated with him, and that Rajiv Gandhi became known as
the man eager to usher India into the twenty-first century, the iconic
representation of which was fittingly a train, which supposedly first propelled
India into modernity, and which today serves as the reminder of a greatness
that India can achieve if it can retain the political integrity of its borders. It is
in Rajiv Gandhi's time that the Indian railways inaugurated its most
prestigious train, the "Shatabdi [literally, a century] Express", as though to
suggest that India would, under his leadership, be well positioned at the
beginning of the next century (and millennium), an ancient civilization once
again poised to leave its impress upon the minds of men and women. The
youth were extolled to excel at sports; the artistic community was urged to
bring home honors; and Indian scientists were encouraged in the belief that
their endeavors would be suitably rewarded. Telecommunications might well
be in a complete shambles, but Rajiv Gandhi's technology adviser could quite
blithely speak of cellular phones as though the day when they would be in
every Indian home, howsoever humble, was just around the corner.
achievements of the sort that are celebrated in the Guinness Book; indeed,
they are quite embarrassed, and occasionally angry, that Indians should be
recognized for endeavors that, on their view, only reinforce Orientalist
representations of Indians as exotic, effeminate, and custom-bound. Nothing
fills Indian elites, who are eager to invite foreign capital into the country, and
crave for the acceptance of India as a tourist mecca, with greater dread than
the thought that India might be construed as backward. (I might note,
incidentally, that the world record for "backwards running" is held by Arvind
Pandya of India: he covered the distance between Los Angeles and New York
City in this fashion in 107 days, from 18 August to 3 December 1984, just at
the time that Rajiv Gandhi was starting to give his painfully monotonous
speeches on taking India forward [p. 785].) These elites cannot but feel that
most Indian achievements are not 'real'; the real, and the capacity to grasp
the real, lies only in the West.
The freakish activities that leave Indian elites disturbed represent, I would
submit, a counter-hegemonic force to modern orthodoxies about
development, production, competition, and modernity. The competitive spirit,
we have been told, brings out the best in human beings, and encourages
people to excel. The narrative of the 'competitive spirit', usually
counterpoised to the stagnation and decay of the East, "vegetating in the
teeth of time" (in Marx's memorable phrase), has a long history in the West.
The story of one element in that narrative is the story of capital, selfaggrandizement, and the greed that drove the West to acquire colonies and
markets overseas; the other element is encapsulated in the phrase 'cultural
capital', though I use it here less in Bourdieu's sense, and more to suggest
that narratives of the like of 'competitive spirit' are used to engender pride in
the nation, refurbish the ever fragile masculinity of man, and promote a
cultural ethos that thrives on such notions as a purported individualism and
self-improvement. It is this 'spirit' of competition that has contributed to the
restlessness, anomie, and anxiety of Indian youth, and to those riots and
disturbances over positions and privileges that have been witnessed in India
from time to time, and which seemed to reach their apogee in 1990 when
several young men took to self-immolation in protest against the stated
policy of the government to implement a plan for increased educational and
employment opportunities for the disadvantaged.
81
Butter is not the only item that is in short supply, or that is unusually
expensive: for the size of Indian cities, there are very few petrol pumps, and
petrol prices are almost exorbitant. Nonetheless, in the city of Poona,
renowned (or so think its residents) for martial valor, a number of its men
could think of no better way of entering into the Guinness Book than by
keeping a motor scooter in nonstop motion for 1,001 hours, covering a
distance of 49,831 miles at Traffic Park between 22 April and 3 June 1990 (p.
371). Many of the Guinness Book's Indian heroes appear quite insistent on
leaving their imprint on the economy, much as they are interested in
acquiring cultural capital. Marriages, according to an old saying, are made in
82
heaven, and one Indian would seem to be quite set on proving this right. An
Indian businessman based in Dubai, one newspaper has reported, recently
chartered an Air-India Airbus so that he could have his son tie the marriage
knot with his fiancee in the presence of a Sikh priest at a height of 20,000
feet above ground. According to the report, "Popley senior said he hopes the
couple, bonded just a tad below heaven, will wing their way into the
Guinness Book of Records."
If the Guinness Book is the poor Indian's medium for acquiring cultural
capital, for the noveau riche their entry into the book of fame, and the book
of numbers, is rendered possible by conspicuous consumption. In either case,
modernity is at once both emulated and defied, honored and parodied,
celebrated and mocked; if the scientific spirit and the competitive ethos
appear to be enshrined, it is unequivocally clear that the achievements
which have enabled Indians (in the most cliched phrase of the times) "to
make history" scarcely rebound to the credit of the nation-state, or do
modernity proud. It is the same ambivalence towards modernity, the ethos of
development and the achievements of science, that can be witnessed in the
photograph that appeared in many Indian newspapers and magazines during
the recent outbreak of plague in Surat, showing a man holding a dead rat in
his naked hand, his mouth covered by a small gauze! Modernity in India is
luckily an unfinished business, and the increasing triumph of Indians in
entering the Guinness Hall of Fame simultaneously enacts a deification and
defilement of modernity. Far from constituting irrefutable evidence of Indians'
feelings of inferiority or their emulation of the 'achieving races', and their
commitment to modernity and the nation-state, the records set by Indians
suggest not only the resilience of a complex civilization against the
homogenizing and deleterious effects of modernity, but also the fact that
resistance in an era of globalization and totalization must perforce enact
both homage and parody.
Much attention has been focussed over the last two decades on the problem
of terrorism, its threat to international peace and security as much as the
sovereignty and integrity of nations, and its obscene repudiation of norms of
civilized conduct. The supposed inexplicability and unpredictability, if not
irrationality, of terrorism are prominently captured in one of the very first
incidents by which it was catapulted into modern-day consciousness. On a
summer day in 1972, three commandos of the Japanese Red Army, wielding
83
The terrorist attack at Lod Airport appeared, in any case, to underline the
international character of terrorism and its arbirtrainess in its mode of
selecting victims. The incident signalled the emergence of a new form of
conflict, the contours of which have been delineated in innumerable studies.
The International Association of Chiefs of Police, at its meeting in 1974,
applied a very simple definition to 'terrorism': it was described as "a
purposeful human activity primarily directed toward the creation of a general
climate of fear designed to influence, in ways desired by the protagonists,
other human beings, and through them some course of events." The Nazis in
Germany and in their acquired territories, the Indonesians in East Timor, the
Khmer Rouge in Cambodia, and other regimes were certainly engaged in
"purposeful human activity" designed to create a "general climate of fear"
that would render their subject populations totally subservient to the ruling
orders, but terrorism has not generally been associated with entire regimes
or other large collectivities on the scale of a nation-state. The inadequacy of
this definition in setting out what precisely constitutes the particularity of
terrorism was soon to lead to attempts at somewhat more exact distinctions.
"Terrorism is the use of criminal violence to force a government to change its
84
There are, it has been said, as many definitions of terrorism as there are
terrorists, but there is certainly widespread agreement that terrorists must
not be allowed to have a free hand. A special American task force "on
combatting terrorism", in its 1986 report to the Vice President of the United
States, enumerated the various measures that could be taken to meet the
threat of terrorism. It recommended the tightening of airport security,
greater cooperation between intelligence and police agencies all over the
world, the development of specially trained forces to handle incidents of
terrorism, and so forth. Similarly, a report published by the U. S. Congress's
Office of Technology Assessment, entitled Technology against Terrorism
(1991), explains how technology is being rendered into the hand-maiden of
counter-terrorist activity. Then there is 'international law', to be made use of
as powerful nations see fit: most recently, the United States, France, and the
United Kingdom were able to enforce, through the vehicle of the United
Nations Security Council, mandatory sanctions against Libya for its alleged
sponsorship of the terrorist bombing in 1988-89 of two civilian aircraft, Pan
Am Flight 103 and UTA Flight 772.
not have foreclosed their options when the decision was taken to combat
terrorism through the adoption of extraordinary legislative measures. A
second, and equally compelling reason, for considering India, Northern
Ireland, and Sri Lanka in conjunction is that in all places terrorism has been
fuelled by secessionism, separatism, and 'communal' hatred. Such terrorism,
apart from its economic roots, has ethnic, linguistic, religious, and cultural
dimensions that terrorism in the former West Germany and to a large extent
in Italy lacked. The comparison between India and Sri Lanka is a particularly
telling one, when we contrast Sikh or Kashmiri separatism in predominantly
Hindu and Hindi-speaking India with Tamil separatism in Sri Lanka, a country
where the majority of the people are Buddhists, of purportedly 'Aryan'
descent, and speakers of Sinhalese. On the other hand, a different historical
perspective might suggest the close affinities between Sri Lanka and
Northern Ireland as societies shaped and marked by an experience of
plantation labor. It is to a more enlarged enumeration of the legal and
political histories of anti-terrorist legislation in Northern Ireland, India, and Sri
Lanka to which I shall now turn.
"removed from the title of the Act" as it "rings increasingly hollow". Only in
this respect was Jellicoe's advice not followed: a new Prevention of Terrorism
(Temporary Provisions) Act came into force in 1984 and given a life of five
years, subject to annual renewal. In 1989, to make the story complete, the
act was again amended, and the following year it was renewed by a
Parliamentary vote of 227 to 136.
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Wide as are the powers that the Sri Lankan government has on account of
the Prevention of Terrorism Act, this is not the only legislation of its kind in
force. The Emergency (Miscellaneous Provisions and Powers) Regulations
made under the Public Security Ordinance, the origins of which go back to
the days of colonialism, empower the executive to arrest and detain suspects
without charge, proscribe political parties, and ban publications. Regulation
15A, which dates to 3 June 1983, is susceptible to even greater abuse. This
Regulation entitles police officers or other authorized persons to take
possession of a dead body and determine the manner in which it is to be
disposed. This Regulation was brought into force after the Jaffna Magistrate
returned a verdict of homicide at the inquest into the death of K. T.
Navaratnarajah, who died in army custody from numerous external and
internal injuries inflicted by blows and weapons. By preventing an inquest
from taking place, Regulation 15A can only encourage functionaries of the
state in the belief that indiscriminate and retributory exercise of their power
will remain unpunished. Sri Lankan legislation shows with greater clarity than
anti-terrorist legislation in Northern Ireland and Britain how democratic
norms are easily subverted on the plea that the state must be equipped to
meet any emergency, especially one that appears to pose grave threats to
national security. Although the Sri Lankan Prevention of Terrorism Act (1979)
was promulgated while an emergency was officially in effect, and the
emergency was lifted on December 27 of that year, the legislation was not
removed, merely because Section 29 of the Act provided for the retention of
the Act for "three years"; moreover, a subsequent amendment to the Act has
given it an indefinite life.
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whatever freedom of expression the Indian press had been allowed. The
exclusion from India of men harboring evil designs towards the Government
of India, 'suspects' in the official vocabulary, was accomplished by the
Foreigners Ordinance of 1914, which restricted the entry of foreigners into
India. The 'foreign hand' theory, which is invoked with notorious monotony
by the Indian state to the present day to account for the rise of secessionist
and communal movements, owes its origins partially to this ordinance.
Meanwhile, the Ingress into India Ordinance (1914) allowed the government
to indefinitely detain and compulsorily domicile suspects, while the Defence
of India Act (1915) allowed suspects to be tried by special tribunals sitting in
camera whose decisions were not subject to appeal. Regulation III also
continued to be available for the indefinite detention of suspects.
As the Defence of India Act was to expire six months after the conclusion of
the war, a new set of emergency measures for the detention and
containment of 'terrorists' to meet what was termed the 'continuing threat'
were planned by the Government of India. These measures were
incorporated within the Anarchical and Revolutionary Crimes Act, known to
Indians as the Rowlatt Act after the name of the chairman of the committee
that recommended the institution of this legislation. The government could
not have known that the Rowlatt Act would become the occasion for the
most widespread movement of opposition to British rule since the Rebellion
of 1857-58 and indeed the springboard from which the movement for
independence would be launched until India was to become irretrievably lost
to the British. The Rowlatt Act provided for the trial of seditious crime by
benches of three judges; the accused were not to have the benefit of either
preliminary commitment proceedings or the right of appeal, and the rules
under which evidence could be obtained and used were relaxed. Other
preventive measures included detention without the levying of charges and
searches without warrants. As the Rowlatt committee noted in its report,
"punishment or acquittal should be speedy both in order to secure the moral
effect which punishment should produce and also to prevent the
prolongation of the excitement which the proceedings may set up."
the present legislation had already been anticipated. With the attainment of
independence, there were anguished debates in the constituent assembly
about whether preventive detention ought to be retained, or whether this
was a measure that could not be maintained with adequate justification as
the country was now no longer under the tutelage of a colonial power. With
independence had come partition, and not only had extraordinary legislation
-- such as the Punjab Disturbed Areas Act, Bihar Maintenance of Public Order
Act, Bombay Public Safety Act, and Madras Suppression of Disturbance Act,
all enacted in 1947-48 -- been required to deal with the problem of
communalism, but also with "anti-social elements" who under the cover of
religion had found the perfect pretext to settle old scores and commit
mayhem. These were the reasons most commonly cited for the retention,
both in the Constitution of India (Art. 22), and in the form of a Preventive
Detention Act (1950), of preventive detention. No doubt too the colonial
legacy could not be abandoned in its entirety in the first flush of freedom.
The Indian state, however, has not been content with merely retaining the
colonial infrastructure of repression, and indeed the last ten years have
witnessed a flurry of legislation that, in many respects, is nothing short of
being frightful. Terrorism in the Punjab, not all of it associated with the
demand for a separate homeland for the Sikhs, has taken a toll of over
15,000 lives since 1980, and likewise there has been very heavy loss of life
in Kashmir, where militants are contesting India's claim to Kashmir. Nor are
these the only states where anti-terrorist legislation has been put into effect;
large parts of the entire north-east are described by the government as
being rife with insurrectionist activity, and Assam, Nagaland, and Mizoram
have all initiated legislation endowing the government with wide-ranging
powers. Whatever the precise causal relationship of such legislation to the
advent of terrorism, and whatever the role of Pakistan, as India claims, in
fomenting political and social unrest in the Punjab and Kashmir, it is quite
clear that some of India's extraordinarily repressive legislation was initiated
well before insurrectionary terrorism was to make its mark. A case in point is
the West Bengal (Prevention of Violent Activities) Act of 1970, which was
inspired by the ambition to crush the Naxalite revolt, a movement of armed
revolutionaries who sought the amelioration of socio-economic inequities
through the use of violence, although one could point with even greater
justification to the Maintenance of Internal Security Act (1971), a piece of
legislation originating in the atmosphere of mutual suspicion and hatred
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between India and Pakistan that was to lead to war between the two
countries in 1971.
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The purportedly temporary nature of anti-terrorist legislation is a fiction. Antiterrorist legislation, as I hope has reasonably been shown, is more easily put
in place than removed. This is as true of the Prevention of Terrorism
(Temporary Provisions) Acts in England and Sri Lanka as it is of certain pieces
of legislation in India. The Maintenance of Internal Security Act (MISA), which
was passed by the Indian Parliament on the grounds that it gave the
government enhanced powers to deal with threats posed to national security
owing to strained relations between India and Pakistan, remained on the law
books until 1978, nearly seven years after the termination of the war with
Pakistan. Moreover, by the 39th Amendment to the Constitution of India,
MISA was placed in the 9th Schedule to the Constitution, thereby making it
totally immune from any judicial review on the ground that it contravened
the Fundamental Rights which are guaranteed by the Constitution. The
history of MISA illustrates a second caveat that democracies should perhaps
take heed of if they are not to be thrown in greater peril than the peril from
which draconian legislation is presumed to rescue them. Legislation is
designed with one intent in mind, and is often used to serve an altogether
different end, and nowhere is this more true than of anti-terrorist legislation
or other like legislation secured in the name of 'national security'. Thus MISA,
far from curbing terrorist activity, and making India safe from its real and
imagined foes, became the central piece in Mrs. Indira Gandhi's singleminded agenda to stifle all dissent, howsoever legitimate, against her
authoritarian rule. MISA made India wholly unsafe, not for her purported
enemies, but for Mrs. Gandhi's critics, as the two-year period of the
emergency between 1975 and 1977, which saw the suspension of
fundamental constitutional rights, was to show so dramatically and painfully.
All laws are subject to abuse, but laws intended to be employed against
terrorists are notoriously susceptible of manipulation by functionaries of the
state, be they army officers, policemen, bureaucrats, or jail wardens. As the
usual safeguards are put in abeyance, there is less effort to ensure that
procedures are in compliance with the law, and immunity from judicial
scrutiny encourages functionaries of the state to use anti-terrorist legislation
to initiate personal vendettas. The problems, however, are much more
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serious than this. Consider, for example, the Terrorist and Disruptive
Activities (Prevention) Act of 1985, otherwise known as TADA. Although the
Indian Government indubitably faces violent opposition by armed militants
advocating separatism, TADA has been used in areas such as Gujarat, which
are not threatened by secessionist or terrorist movements, to crush
legitimate, usually non-violent, political activity among students and workers.
The largest number of arrests under TADA have been made, not in the
Punjab or Assam, but in Gujarat. Similarly the elite Central Industrial Security
Force, which was created and empowered by special legislation to protect
major industrial undertakings from terrorist or otherwise violent attacks, has
often been employed to suppress trade union activity. The sheer illegitimacy,
and not mere abuse, of this legislation is suggested by the fact that only 434
of the 52,998 people detained under TADA by the end of 1992 were
convicted. If this 0.81 percent conviction rate constitutes a severe indictment
of TADA and the Indian state, what are we to think of the 0.37 percent
conviction rate for TADA detenu in the Punjab, which at one time the Indian
government was apt to characterize as lost to terrorism?
would have allowed the government to tamper with the mail of Indian
citizens in the name of 'national security'.
Though India's higher courts and, in particular, the Supreme Court have
often been sensitive to the grim social realities, and have on occasion given
relief to the oppressed, the poor do not have the capacity to represent
themselves, or to take advantage of progressive legislation. In 1982, the
Supreme Court conceded that unusual measures were warranted to enable
people the full realization of not merely their civil and political rights, but the
enjoyment of economic, social, and cultural rights, and in its far- reaching
decision in the case of PUDR [People's Union for Democratic Rights] vs. Union
of India [1982 (2) S.C.C. 253], it recognized that a third party could directly
petition, whether through a letter or other means, the Court and seek its
intervention in a matter where another party's fundamental rights were
being violated. In this case, adverting to the Constitutional prohibition on
"begar", or forced labor and traffic in human beings, PUDR submitted that
workers contracted to build the large sports complex at the Asian Game
Village in Delhi were being exploited. PUDR asked the Court to recognize that
"begar" was far more than compelling someone to work against his or her
will, and that work under exploitative and grotesquely humiliating conditions,
or work that was not even compensated by prescribed minimum wages, was
violative of fundamental rights. As the Supreme Court noted,
The rule of law does not mean that the protection of the aw must be
available only to a fortunate few or that the law should be allowed to be
prostituted by the vested interests for protecting and upholding the status
quo under the guise of enforcement of their civil and political rights. The poor
too have civil and political rights and rule of law is meant for them also,
though today it exists only on paper and not in reality. If the sugar barons
and the alcohol kings have the fundamental right to carry on their business
and to fatten their purses by exploiting the consuming public, have the
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Thus the court was willing to acknowledge that it had a mandate to advance
the rights of the disadvantaged and poor, though this might be at the behest
of individuals or groups who themselves claimed no disability. Such litigation,
termed Public Interest Litigation or Social Action Litigation by its foremost
advocate, Professor Upendra Baxi, has given the court "epistolary
jurisdiction".
Former Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri's eldest surviving son Anil Shastri
has stirred a hornet's nest by demanding an inquiry and declassification of
records concerning the controversial death of his father 49 years ago. Shastri
has gone public with his family's belief that his father did not die a natural
death.
The demand, coming as it does just before Shastri's birth anniversary and
disclosure of the West Bengal government dossier on Subhas Bose, is likely
to die out unlike previous occasions.
Some Twitterati are coming down on Anil, a senior Congress party leader,
asking why is he raising the matter at this moment.
The fact of the matter is that the Shastri family has always taken this line.
From day one, from the time the former PM's mother saw her son's body, the
family suspected poisoning. They demanded autopsy and an inquiry but it
was of no avail. The Congress government simply brushed the matter under
the carpet.
The issue was revived only in 2009 when this writer filed RTI requests with
the prime minister's office (PMO) and the ministry of external affairs.
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Believe it or not, the PMO informed me that it possessed one, just one,
classified document relating to former prime minister's controversial death.
The ministry of external affairs wanted me to believe that its "concerned
division" had no information on the subject matter. I disbelieved it because
the sudden death of the prime minister must have thrown the Indian
embassy in Moscow in a tizzy. Our ambassador in Moscow, TN Kaul, must
have scrambled to inform Delhi of the tragedy. A flurry of telephone calls and
telegrams over the tragic development would have ensued for weeks. The
ministry would have gone on an overdrive to find out the circumstances
leading to the prime minister's death. The ambassador must have sent a
blow-by-blow report, and he must have done that, after checking the facts
with the Russian authorities.
So I flatly rejected the line MEA had given me. I was uneasy with their
statement that the only main record available with the Indian embassy in
Moscow was the report of the joint medical investigation conducted by
Shastri's doctor RN Chugh and the Soviet doctors. The ministry confirmed
that no post mortem was carried out in Moscow. I also got to know from the
Delhi Police through another RTI reply that no post mortem was conducted in
India either. Only an autopsy could have completely ruled out the poisoning
charges.
would prejudicially affect the sovereignty and integrity of India, the security,
strategic, scientific or economic interests of the State, relation with foreign
State or lead to incitement of an offence".
It was only after the intervention of chief information commissioner
Sadananad Mishra that the MEA in August 2011 supplied me copies of Dr
Chugh's medical report and a copy of the statement made by the external
affairs minister in the Rajya Sabha. The medical report attributed the cause
of death to "an acute attack of infarct miocarda (myocardial infarction)".
Now, there are several circumstances on record going against it the official
line.
For a start, the Russian butler serving Shastri had been arrested - this fact
came to light only decades later. Ahmed Sattarov, the butler, himself told
British and later Russia media that a few hours after Shastri died he was
woken up by an officer of the Ninth Directorate of the KGB. Suspecting that
the Indian PM had been poisoned, the KGB men took Sattarov and others to a
dungeon and subject them to a thorough interrogation.
It is not known that whether TN Kaul personal cook placed in the service of
the prime minister was also interrogated. It seems from extant records that
this cook, Jan Mohammed, was posted in the Rashtrapati Bhavan after he
was moved from Moscow. Kaul became India's foreign secretary.
In the last few years I have had occasions to personally discuss the matter
with Shastriji's youngest surviving son Sunil and Shastriji's two grandsons,
Sanjay Nath Singh and Siddharth Nath Singh. The family firmly believes that
PM Shastri was murdered. They also raise suspicions about the fate that
befell Dr Chug and other members of Shastri's personal staff.
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He restored the confidence of the Indian armed forces that had experienced
a humiliating defeat in 1962 following the Chinese aggression. More
importantly, he very successfully filled the post-Nehru void as during the last
year or so of the Nehru era, the political atmosphere in India was agog with
the question "Who after Nehru?"
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Many may not know that Shastriji was responsible for ending disparity in
passenger amenities in different classes prevalent in the railways during
those days. He abolished the luxury class and the most neglected third class.
As the railway minister he improved amenities for the poor and deprived
sections of the passenger community.
Known for his soft, accommodative approach, Shastriji very adroitly handled
the anti-Hindi agitation and accepted that English too would continue as one
of the official languages. He, very successfully, doused the fires of linguistic
conflict.
In so far as his visionary policies are concerned, he laid the foundation of the
Green Revolution and gave impetus to the Operation Flood campaign that
ultimately led to the strengthening of our dairy industry and eventually the
White Revolution as well. It was his brief tenure that saw the foundation of
the National Dairy Development Board (NDDB).
However, his governance, more than anything else, always had an indelible
mark of complete accountability and ownership of responsibility. While he
was railway minister, in 1956, there were two railway mishaps, the first in
September 1956, at Mahbubnagar that led to 112 deaths. Accepting
complete responsibility, he tendered resignation which was rejected by prime
minister Nehru.
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In 1965, while facing severe shortage of rice and other foodgrains, he easily
prepared popular mindset to give up evening meals on Mondays. This was
his way of making people participate in the government's efforts to achieve
national goals. While the nation was facing challenges on the economic front,
a simple appeal by him to women worked wonders and many offered their
gold ornaments for the cause of the nation.
His slogan, "Jai Jawan, Jai Kisan" caught the imagination of the people as it
underscored the need for involvement of people in both defence
preparedness and food security. No wonder, years later, in 1998, the then
prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee built on the same slogan and added a
suffix "Jai Vigyan".
Shastri's leadership was put to test during the 1965 war with Pakistan and
later while negotiating peace with Pakistan, from a position of strength.
Without mincing words, he told Pakistan that misadventures will cost her
dearly.
Without his visionary statesmanship, our issues with Sri Lanka concerning
the Tamil population there would have been far too complicated. Provisions
of the Srimavo-Shastri pact were remarkable for his quest to find a
permanent solution to the Tamil question.
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Today, when the Congress finds the going tough, it can take a couple of
leaves out of Lal Bahadur Shastri's politics as well as policies. This is relevant
as the Grand Old Party of India almost completely lacks emotional connect
with the people, leadership and more importantly, faces a grave crisis of
ownership as well.
We have several friendly countries as neighbours, but one of them - a
terrorist - is enough to cancel out those friendly benefits. We have been
investing - both men and materials - so much in our defence plans because
of this one terrorist. It all started with Partition, and despite nearly seven
decades since then, the rivalry - albeit with patches of white flags in between
- continues.
India is now celebrating the 50th anniversary of its 1965 war victory over
Pakistan. Did we really win the war? It's not just us, but neutral analysts also
say so. However, Pakistan has always claimed they too won it. They claim
they defended the Indian forces with great pride and celebrate September 6
every year as their Defence Day! But it is a country that repeatedly says it
does not sponsor cross border terrorism. Everybody laughs at that
statement, maybe even the Pakistan leaders too, in private.
Kashmir has always been a jewel Pakistan wanted to possess. They devised
Operation Gibraltar for it. It failed, and a war ensued. American author
Stanley Wolpert wrote in his book India that "Ayub [Khan] was a giant of a
man, as tall and sturdy as India's Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri was
small and physically frail. But India's army was four times larger than
Pakistan's, and quickly dispelled the popular Pakistani myth that one Muslim
soldier was "worth ten Hindus"." He concluded that India was in a position to
inflict grave damage to, if not capture, Pakistan's capital of the Punjab when
the ceasefire was called, and controlled Kashmir's strategic Uri-Poonch bulge,
much to Ayub's chagrin.
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The United Nations suggested a ceasefire and both countries agreed to it.
The formalities were later completed with the signing of the Tashkent
Declaration. In hindsight, it was just one of the several agreements the two
countries had signed. But as Wolpert wrote, Shastri never awoke to help
implement that hopeful accord. He was found dead. No post-mortem. No
official inquiry. Crisis man Gulzarilal Nanda was readied a second time to
swear in as prime minister. End of story.
Current defence minister Manohar Parrikar has been critical of the Indian
media that they did not give necessary coverage to the celebrations of the
war victory anniversary. But what respect has the nation returned to Shastri?
Even after 49 years of his death, Shastri's family has been asking for nothing
more than justice to his memory. His family says his body sported blue
patches by the time it reached India and that it also had several injury marks
on it. As you would expect, our government still keeps classified files about
Shastri's death, much like in the case of Subhas Chandra Bose.
The biggest asset of the small and frail Shastri was the power of his tactics.
More than anything, he could direct an army which Pakistan thought was
completely demoralised after losing the war to China. It also showed the
decision makers under Shastri were quite apt for the job. Through his slogan
"Jai Jawan Jai Kisan", Shastri could enthuse both the soldiers and the farmers
alike. Soldiers were cheered to defend the country and farmers were cheered
to increase food production and reduce import in war time.
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Will we give Shastri his due? Indian government fears that the truth about
Shastri's death will harm our foreign relations. Doesn't the government in a
democratic country owe certain responsibilities to the public? Soviet Russia
undoubtedly holds the keys to resolving the death/disappearance mysteries
of two of India's foremost leaders. No celebration is good if the nation does
not care for its leaders who brought freedom and who defended the enemy
with great pride and passion.
After the Indo-Pak war in 1965, Lal Bahadur Shastri travelled to Tashkent to
sign an agreement that would formally end the war on 10th January, 1966.
One day later, he was found dead. It was alleged that he died of a heart
attack but the circumstances seemed extremely suspicious. Recently
Shastri's family has also asked files related to his demise be declassified, just
like Subhash Chandra Bose's. Until then, we can only jump into the pond of
conspiracies and fish out what could be the truth.
Here are 8 mysteries and conspiracies surrounding the death of Lal Bahadur
Shastri:
1. Where are the records of the first inquiry into his death?
The Raj Narain Inquiry apparently could not come up with any conclusions,
however there are no records in the Parliament's library of this inquiry.
Regardless of the conclusion, it does raise questions as to why the report is
missing, suppressed or destroyed.
Source: ceylon-ananda
2. There was no post-mortem conducted. Or was there?
His wife Lalitha said the body was blue and there were cut marks. A body
turns blue if it is embalmed. If there was no post-mortem conducted, then
why would these indications be there? And if it was, where are the reports?
3. Could it be poisoning?
His personal doctor, RN Chugh, had said that he was in perfect health and
never had any heart issues in the past. A heart attack seemed highly
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unlikely. And since there were claims that there was no post-mortem
conducted, then the puncture marks could be a result of poisoning.
Source: knowquot
4. What about the witnesses?
There were two witnesses the night Shastri died and they were scheduled to
be in front of the parliamentary body in 1977. One was Dr RN Chugh, who
was on his way to testify in front of the committee but was hit by a truck and
died.
The other was his servant Ram Nath who visited Shastri's home first and
according to the family members he said, Bahut din ka bojh tha, amma. Aaj
sab bata denge (I have been carrying this burden too long. I will shed it
today). He too was hit by a car. His legs were crushed and had to be
amputated. He lost his memory.
5. What of the CIA agent's word?
Gregory Douglas, a journalist, interviewed CIA agent Robert Crowley, who
confirmed that the death of Lal Bahadur Shastri and even Dr Homi Bhabha
(father of Nuclear Science in India) was the work of the CIA. Shastri gave the
green light for nuclear tests and the US seemed threatened by India
emerging as a reformed state and also of Indo-Russian dominance in the
region. The interview was published in a book called, "Conversations with the
Crow" .
Source: crooksandliars
6. Was the Russian butler involved?
The butler was serving the then PM and was in fact arrested. He had easy
access to Shastri and if in fact he was poisoned, the butler would certainly be
a big suspect. But he was allowed to walk and the authorities maintained
that Shastri died of cardiac arrest.
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Lal Bahadur Shastri was sixteen when Gandhiji called upon his countrymen
to join the Non-Cooperation Movement. He decided at once to give up his
studies in response to the Mahatmas call. The decision shattered his
mother,s hopes. The family could not dissuade him from what they thought
was a disastrous course of action. But Lal Bahadur had made up his mind. All
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those who were close to him knew that he would never change his mind
once it was made up, for behind his soft exterior was the firmness of a rock.
Lal Bahadur Shastri joined the Kashi Vidya Peeth in Varanasi, one of the
many national institutions set up in defiance of the British rule. There, he
came under the influence of the greatest intellectuals, and nationalists of the
country. Shastri was the bachelors degree awarded to him by the Vidya Peeth
but has stuck in the minds of the people as part of his name.
In 1927, he got married. His wife, Lalita Devi, came from Mirzapur, near his
home town. The wedding was traditional in all senses but one. A spinning
wheel and a few yards of handspun cloth was all the dowry. The bridegroom
would accept nothing more.
In 1930, Mahatma Gandhi marched to the sea beach at Dandi and broke the
imperial salt law. The symbolic gesture set the whole country ablaze. Lal
Bahadur Shastri threw himself into the struggle for freedom with feverish
energy. He led many defiant campaigns and spent a total of seven years in
British jails. It was in the fire of this struggle that his steel was tempered and
he grew into maturity.
When the Congress came to power after Independence, the sterling worth of
the apparently meek and unassuming Lal Bahadur Shastri had already been
recognised by the leader of the national struggle. When the Congress
Government was formed in 1946, this \'little dynamo of a man, was called
upon to play a constructive role in the governance of the country. He was
appointed Parliamentary Secretary in his home State of Uttar Pradesh and
soon rose to the position of Home Minister. His capacity for hard work and his
efficiency became a byeword in Uttar Pradesh. He moved to New Delhi in
1951 and held several portfolios in the Union Cabinet - Minister for Railways
Minister for Transport and Communications; Minister for Commerce and
Industry; Home Minister; and during Nehru,s illness Minister without portfolio.
He was growing in stature constantly. He resigned his post as Minister for
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More than thirty years of dedicated service were behind Lal Bahadur Shastri.
In the course of this period, he came to be known as a man of great integrity
and competence. Humble, tolerant, with great inner strength and
resoluteness, he was a man of the people who understood their language. He
was also a man of vision who led the country towards progress. Lal Bahadur
Shastri was deeply influenced by the political teachings of Mahatma Gandhi.
Hard work is equal to prayer, he once said, in accents profoundly reminiscent
of his Master. In the direct tradition of Mahatma Gandhi, Lal Bahadur Shastri
represented the best in Indian culture.
Lal Bahadur Shastri was the second Prime Minister of independent India and
a significant figure in the struggle for independence. Shashtriji was born in
Mughalsarai, in Uttar Pradesh. To take part in the non-cooperation movement
of Mahatma Gandhi in 1921, he began studying at the nationalist, Kashi
Vidyapeeth in Kashi, and upon completion, he was given the title Shastri, or
Scholar, Doctor at Kashi Vidyapeeth in 1926. He spent almost nine years in
jail in total, mostly after the start of the Satyagraha movement in 1940, he
was imprisoned until 1946. Following Indias independence, he was Home
Minister under Chief Minister Govind Ballabh Pant of Uttar Pradesh. In 1951,
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rather it did not have to reflect. Not at the start of the day and certainly not
after the sun has set.
Siyaasat aaj diqqat mein hai; uski sifat taqliif mein hai. Aawaam kaa aitbaar
us par agar aataa hai, to ruktaa nahiin. Siyaasii insaan aaj mushkilii mein hai.
Aam log usko apnaa rakhvaalaa samjhte hein lekin rahbar ya rahnumaa
nahiin. Log us mein prerana dhundhtein hein, paate hein kuchh aur. Yah
afsos kii baat hai, intahaa afsos kii.
(This is more than a pity; it is a tragedy. For, until not long ago, politics
meant public service of the highest, most self-denying, self-effacing kind.
Those who wanted to be useful to society and earn an honest wage, joined
the civil or military services, the magistracy, took up professional careers.
Those who wanted to be useful without bothering about earnings, took to
political work. Politicians were volunteers in a spontaneous self-conscription
for national service. Politics was, almost, a monastic order.)
Politicians once lived unostentatiously, often frugally and never flaunted their
wealth, which they had either inherited with dignity or acquired outside
politics through other careers with honesty.
Above all, politicians had a cause or a set of causes beyond and larger than
themselves. Self-interest, self-protection and self-advancement did not occur
to them. They stood for selflessness. Stood, I say that in the past tense.
Khadaa honaa rajnitigyon ko aaj bhii aataa hai, chunaavon mein khadaa
honaa, leaderon ke saamne jhat utth khadaa honaa, manch par khadaa
honaa, Sansad mein bulaye-na-bulaaye khadaa honaa. Aur haan, adaalat ke
kathghare mein khadaa honaa. Lekin paidal chalnaa aaj viral ho gayaa hai.
Zamaanaa thaa jub siyaasat apne pairon par chaltii thii. Aaj vah chalti kam
hai, chalaatii ziadah hai.
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Mostly, politicians do not walk now as much as they move. Literally, in moves
and manoeuvres. Just like chessmen, they move adroitly, some with
smartness, some moving sideways and then leaping forward, some two
steps at a time, displacing the person ahead and moving in the swift sweep
of a knight or the slow swagger of a castle. Those who walk one step at a
time, are pawns, mere pawns.
The other requirement for politicians, namely, of them being able to talk,
explain and persuade is now practised in a slightly different way. They talk to
clarify what they have complicated and explain what they have knotted up.
And so they also hector and harangue to overwhelm.
Besides that, politics has found a new ally in money. I have said new ally, but
that is not quite right. Politics has always needed money for elections, for
publicising its programmes, running its campaigns and for offices. Politics
once used money and now money uses politics. That is the difference. It is
not as if all politicians are in the clutches of money, certainly not. But the
surface density of politicians who are not has become alarmingly thin.
Politics has always known risks of failure, mainly of defeat and even violence.
But today, politics is not just risky, it is full of danger. The politics-money
nexus has made it so. Not just those in politics, but also those who question
the nexus, are in danger, just look at the number of RTI activists who have
been killed. Ask and it shall be given has acquired a new meaning.
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In this state of our political reality, our siyaasii haqiqaat, I ask myself: would
the strong yet gentle, the soft-spoken but utterly clear-worded, the selfeffacing patriot of patriots Lal Bahadur Shastri recognise Indian politics
today? He would not. And conversely, do politicians in India today
especially the young ones recognise that soul of probity, dedication and
service? They do not. How can they, for he was the very antithesis of Indian
politics as they or we know it now.
When he told an agitated Tamil Nadu that Hindi would not be imposed on
them against their will, Periyar Ramasamy and C. N. Annadurai trusted him.
His word was enough. In Tamil, one would say, he enjoyed nambikkai. Being
true to ones word was a quality that marked other Congress leaders of the
Gandhi-Nehru-Patel generation as well, and of those outside the Congress in
the Left, like Acharya Narendra Deva, P. Sundarayya, E.M.S. Namboodiripad,
Jayaprakash Narayan, Kamaladevi Chattopadhyay, Aruna Asaf Ali, Renu
Chakravartty, and on the Right like Nanaji Deshmukh, Homi Mody, Nani
Palkhivala.
Which is why his exceptional leadership of India through the 1965 war
brought to him the spontaneous solidarity of all classes of its people. Shastriji
was not spared opposition, but neither did he resent it, nor was he unnerved
by it. When Rajaji referred to the concept of autonomy in the context of
Kashmir, a Congress leader appealed to Shastriji, who was the then prime
minister, to invoke the laws of sedition against the octogenarian leader.
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Shastriji showed that great as the victory in a just war was, a greater victory
lay in a just peace. Even as the lamp of his mortal life went out in Tashkent,
his stature found eternal light. President Radhakrishnan, in conferring the
Bharat Ratna on Shastriji posthumously, recognised in the Tashkent
Declaration a supremely Ashokan moment Ashokan in its strength, Ashokan
in its humanity.
The Shimla Agreement of 1972 took that further into an agreement reached
in a new context. More meaningful than Shastrijis brilliant leadership in the
1965 war and more relevant than his inspired Jai Jawan, Jai Kisan thought,
was his firm refusal throughout his political life to hurl stones, arrows or
bullets at colleagues or opponents. He rose sky-high in dignity because he
never trampled on the dignity of his fellows. Wanting no one to feel small, he
towered great.
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WHILE Mayawati government earned praise from Lal Bahadur Shastri's family
for converting his ancestral house in Varanasi into a museum last week, his
memorial in New Delhi located next to 10, Janpath is witnessing a
protracted battle. Between those entrusted to preserve and promote the
former prime minister's ideals and those in charge of Congress president
Sonia Gandhi's security.
The Special Protection Group (SPG)'s insistence on not allowing parking of
vehicles near the memorial is said to have become a big deterrence for those
interested in the life and works of the second prime minister who succeeded
Jawaharlal Nehru.
The memorial authorities are learnt to have taken up the issue with Sonia
also but to no avail.
Opposition BJP has now decided to jump into the fray with senior leader
Ananth Kumar, one of the trustees of the Lal Bahadur Shastri National
Memorial Trust, taking up the cudgels. "This is a sad state of affairs. I am
going to write a letter to the Prime Minister, who is the chairman of the trust,
seeking his intervention in the matter. Shastri was an icon because of his
simplicity, humility and sacrifices. This shows the apathy of the Congress-led
government, which is not moved unless it is a Nehru or Gandhi memorial,"
he told The Indian Express.
The same day, the former PM's son Anil Shastri, a Special Invitee to the
Congress Working Committee and Editor of party mouthpiece Congress
Sandesh, tweeted: "Mayawati govt needs to be complimented for converting
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The memorial in New Delhi had been approved by the previous NDA
government only to gather dust in government files until the change of
regime, which saw Prime Minister Manmohan Singh taking keen interest in
the project.
Inaugurating it on May 7, 2005, Singh had stated: " Shastriji gave our country
a sense of security and comfort during a turbulent and trying period, when
the world speculated over the question, 'After Nehru Who?'"
Shastri's son and one of the trustees, Sunil Shastri, sought to downplay the
issue. "We have already taken up the matter with the SPG. It has been
pending for a long time, but it is a high security area. We are trying our
best."
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Shastri has been forgotten by the nation. He has been pushed into the
background. I have no doubt that there was a Congress conspiracy to
underplay Shastri after his death.
The Congress is the party that should have put him to the fore but I
remember visiting a Congress meeting where Shastri's portrait was not even
displayed with respect.
He simply didn't fit in. Mrs Gandhi was strongly against the Congress old
guard. When he died there was a strong resistance against his cremation in
the area where Gandhi and Nehru had been laid to rest. Most Congressmen
wanted his body taken to Allahabad. When Mrs Lalita Shastri said she would
go public only then did the Congressmen relent.
They even protested against inscribing the slogan -- Jai Jawan, Jai Kisan on
his samadhi. Then again, only when Mrs Shastri threatened to go on a
hunger strike was it was allowed.
Shastri represents an ideology that was right of Centre but not left of Centre.
After all, he is the man who said we need the five-year plan but let us have a
one year holiday from plan.
I remember vividly a small incident that brought out the stark difference
between the two (Shastri and Indira Gandhi) leaders.
During Shastri's tenure his home in Janpath was upgraded quite a bit to suit
the status of a PM.
After his death, while searching for a suitable home Mrs Gandhi went to see
Shastri's home. She entered the home, had a round inside and said, "middle
class!"
He gave two names in order. First, Jayaprakash Narayan and second, Indira
Gandhi. He told me he wanted a unanimous decision over the selection. "But
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Probably he was right. However, the question didn't arise because Kamaraj
was asked to talk to members informally. Shastri was made PM but
Morarjibhai never accepted the decision.
After Shastri became PM he had to face the war with Pakistan. When the
Chamb border was attacked Shastri was asked to take a tough decision
whether to cross the international border. The army chief said it would be
difficult to hold on for long at Chamb. Shastri gave the order saying -- before
they can capture Chamb you should capture Lahore.
After the war was over, I asked Indira Gandhi if Nehru would have allowed
the crossing of the international border. Mrs Gandhi said, 'Whatever the
generals would have advised him he would have followed."
But I wonder.
After the war, Shastri's name was all over. Before the war many people
laughed at him for his softness but not after the war. He came out as a tough
hero.
His toughness was evident at Tashkent. When Russian Prime Minister Alexei
Kosygin (left: Shastri with Kosygin and Indian's then external affairs minister
Swaran Singh) wanted Shastri to sign the agreement for peace with General
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Ayub Khan of Pakistan after the 1965 war, Shastri insisted on adding the
assurance, "never again will weapons be used to sort out problems between
India and Pakistan."
Ayub finally wrote it at the very last moment. General Ayub's handwritten
assurance is still preserved in the Indian archives. Shastri was a slight person
but with a strong mind.
But the Congress has changed completely. Since Mrs Gandhi said that
corruption is a world phenomenon, Congressmen are not losing sleep over it.
Neither can I imagine Shastri imposing the Emergency.
All those Congressmen seen active during the Emergency are part of this
government. Ambika Soni is a confidante of Sonia Gandhi, Pranab Mukherjee,
Arjun Singh, Kamal Nath all were part of the establishment then.
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While cajoling him not to entertain an such idea I said, "Nehru has you in his
mind."
Shastri said, "Unke dimag main to unki putri hai. (He has his daughter in his
mind as successor.)"
In 1942 (during the Quit India Movement), when he was in a jail, his daughter
was ill and he was released on parole. But he could not save her life because
doctors had recommended costly drugs.
Shastri never made money. In 1963, on the day when he was dropped under
the Kamaraj plan I went to meet him. He was sitting in his home without a
light.
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"Why are you sitting in the dark?" I asked. He said, "From today all expenses
will be borne by me." He told me as a MP and minister he didn't earn enough
to save for his rainy day.
The second column was on Nehru but before he could write more he was
recalled tothe Cabinet.
I don't see the revival of the values Shastri stood for. A day before his first
press conference after becoming PM I asked him what will be your message
tomorrow?
He said: "I'll tell them that during my tenure there will not be any increase in
food price and as PM of India I would ask members of the Planning
Commission to have one more column in their charts to show me how many
jobs will be created after spending thousands of crores of rupees."
He was a man concerned about the common man of India. Can these values
return to this country?
The gardener smiled with pity and said, "Because you are an orphan, you
must learn better behavior, my boy."
The words of the gardener had a great effect on him. He swore to him, "I
shall behave better in future. Because I am an orphan I must learn good
behavior."
Though short he was not timid at school. All boys were friendly with him. Like
the grass he always looked fresh and smiling. Not only during his school days
but also in his later life he did not hate anyone. It seems he used to act in
plays at school. He played the role of Kripacharya in the play
'Mahabharatha'. Kripacharya was in the court of Duryodhana and yet was
loved by the Pandavas. Lal Bahadur Shastri had acquired the same worth.
Even when Lal Bahadur was a student of Harischandra. High School at
Varanasi a whirlwind had disturbed India.
Everywhere there was the cry of 'Freedom'! "Swaraj is our birth right" - Bala
Gangadhara Tilak had declared. This had become the nation's battlecry.
Lal Bahadur reverenced Tilak. He longed to see him and hear his speech.
Once Tilak visited Varanasi. Lal Bahadur was away in a village fifty miles from
Varanasi. He borrowed money and traveled in a train to see and hear Tilak.
He saw him and heard his speech. It reverberated in his ears like Krishna's
conch, thePanchajanya. Like Bharata, carrying Rama's sandals on his head,
Lal Bahadur carried Tilak's message in his heart. This message guided him
all through his life.The greatest influence on Lal Bahadur was that of
Mahatma Gandhi. Lal Bahadur was electrified when he heard a speech of
Gandhi at Varanasi in 1915. Then and there he dedicated his life to the
service of the country.
n 1921, Mahatma Gandhi launched the non-cooperation movement against
British Government and declared that the country would not cooperate with
the Government in its unjust rule. Lal Bahadur was then only seventeen
years. When Mahatma Gandhi gave a call to the youth to come out of
Government schools and colleges, offices and courts and to sacrifice
everything for the sake of freedom, Lal Bahadur came out of his school.
His mother and other relatives advised him not to give up his studies. But Lal
Bahadur was firm in his decision -Lai Bahadur joined the procession, which
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disobeyed the prohibitory order. The police arrested him. But as he was too
young, he was let off.
Lal Bahadur did not go back to his school. He became a student of Kashi
Vidya Peeth. During his four years' stay there, he made excellent progress.
Dr.Bhagawandas's lectures on philosophy went straight to his heart. In later
life Lal Bahadur displayed surprising poise in the midst of conflict and
confusion. This he learnt from his teacher, Bhagawandas.
It was in 1926 that Lal Bahadur got the degree of 'Shastri' and left the Kashi
Vidya Peeth. The whole country became the arena of his activity. He became
the life- member of The Servants of the People Society, which Lala Lajpat Rai
had started in 1921. The aim of the Society was to train youths that were
prepared to dedicate their lives to the service of the country.
One of the rules of the Society required the members to take an oath to
serve the Society at least for twenty years and to lead a simple and honest
life till the end. Lal Bahadur earned the love and affection of Lajpat Rai by his
earnestness and hard work. Later he became the President of the Society.
Shastriji married in 1927. Lalitha Devi, his bride, came from Mirzalyur. The
wedding was celebrated in the simplest way. All that the bridegroom took as
a gift from father-in-law was a charaka and a few yards of Khadi.
The struggle for freedom was intensifield all over the country in 1930.
Mahatma Gandhi started the 'Salt Satyagraha'. Lal Bahadur took a leading
role in it.
From this time onwards prison became his second home. He was sent to
prison seven times and was forced to spend nine long years in various
prisons on different occasions.
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His going to prison was a blessing in disguise. He had time to read a number
of good books. He became familiar with the works of western philosophers,
revolutionaries and social reformers. He translated the autobiography of
Madam Curie (a French scientist who discovered radium) into Hindi.
Lal Bahadur's virtues shone even in the prison. He was a ideal prisoner. 'He
was a model to others in discipline and restraint. Many political prisoners
used to quarrel among themselves for small things. They used to cringe for
small favors before the officials of the prison. But Lal Bahadur used to give
up his comforts for others.
The greatness of Lal Bahadur was that he maintained his self-respect 'even
in prison. Once when he was in prison, one of his daughters fell seriously ill.
The officers agreed to let him out for a short time but on condition that he
should agree in writing not to take part in the freedom 'movement during
this period. Lal Bahadur did not wish to participate in the freedom movement
during his temporary release from prison; but he said that he would not give
it in writing. He thought that it was against his self-respect to give it in
writing. The officers knew that he was truthful. Therefore they did not insist.
Lal Bahadur was released for fifteen days.
But his daughter died before he, reached home. After performing the
obsequies he returned to his prison even before the expiry of the period.
A year passed. His son was laid up with influenza this time. Lal Bahadur was
permitted unconditionally to go home for a week. But the fever did not come
down in a week. Lal Bahadur got ready to go back to prison. The boy pleaded
dumbly with his tearful eyes.
For a moment the father's mind was shaken. Tears rolled down from his eyes.
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But the next moment his decision was made. He bade good bye to all and
left his home for prison. His son survived.
Two qualities, which the leader of any nation must have, are devotion and
efficiency. Lal Bahadur had both the qualities in a large measure. He would
not swerve from his aim, come what may. When the people of India. Were
fighting for freedom he brushed aside all thought of personal happiness and
plunged into the freedom struggle. His daughter'sdeath, his son's illness,
poverty - none of these made him swerve from his selection path. Even when
he became a minister and, later, the Prime Minister he was never attracted
to a life of luxury and comfort.
When the Second World War broke out in 1939, the leaders of our country
were in a dilemma. When the people of India were slaves how could they
support the cause of Britain?
The freedom struggle became more widespread and intense. The prisons
were bursting with political prisoners.
On 8th August 1942, the Indian National Congress which led the fight for
freedom decided at its historic meeting in Bombay to sound the trumpet for
the final struggle against the British in India. It called on the British to 'Quit
India'. The people were determined to 'do or die'.
The government reacted sharply to these calls and arrested many leaders.
Prisons became over-crowded. The government used all cruel methods of
suppression to nip the movement in the bud.
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Lal Bahadur, who had just then come out after a year in prison, traveled from
Bombay to Allahabad by train. He got off at a station, unknown to the police.
For a whole week he used to send instructions to the freedom fighters from
Anand Bhavan, Jawaharlal Nehru's home in Allahabad.
Vijayalakshmi Pandit, the sister of Nehru, lived in Anand Bhavan at the time.
The police came there to arrest her and to take possession of the house. Lal
Bahadur destroyed all-important documents. Luckily, the police arrested only
Vijayalakshmi Pandit and went away.
A few days later Lal Bahadur who was underground came out and shouted
slogans against the government. The police arrested him then.
India got freedom in 1947.Lal Bahadur's administrative ability and skill in
organization came to light in the days following India's freedom. He was an
expert in the art of bringing together people and winning their hearts. Pandit
Govind Vallabh Pant, the leader of Uttar Pradesh, was the first to recognize
this talent of Shastriji and to encourage him. He earned the love of Pant by
his hard work during the elections of 1946 in the provinces. The Congress
Office had become Shastriji's home during that period. The Congress won a
resounding victory in the elections.
When Govind Vallabh Pant became the Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh, he
wished to train able young men to run the government. But it was not easy
to please him. Lal Bahadur did not want any office; yet he was appointed as
Parliamentary Secretary to Pant. Pant praised him as 'likable, hard-working,
devoted, trustworthy and non-controversial'.
Later, in 1947, Lal Bahadur became the Minister of Police and Transport in
Pant's Ministry. He took many steps to bring discipline into the
administration. As Transport Minister he subjected government buses to
discipline. He was the first to appoint women conductors. Usually the
minister in charge of the Police Department will not remain popular for long.
But Lal Bahadur Shastri never allowed the police to resort to lathi charge and
firing. He ordered that using jets of water instead of lathis should disperse
unruly crowds. Though there were many strikes in Uttar Pradesh when he
was in office, there was not a single occasion when people shouted slogans
against him.
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Lal Bahadur was a lover of cricket. Once he was watching a match at Kanpur.
Trouble broke out among the spectators. The Police and young men came to
blows. Since Shastriji was on the spot thesituation did not go out of control.
The young men demanded that the red turbans' (thepolice) should not be
found on the cricket ground and Lal Bahadur agreed. But the police were
there the next day. The young men became angry with Shastriji and
protested. Lal Bahadur laughed and said, "I fulfilled my promise to you
faithfully. You did not want red turbans to be here. You see the police are now
wearing khaki turbans." The spectators laughed and dropped the matter.
In the first General Elections after India became a Republic, the Congress
Party returned to power with a huge majority. Lal Bahadur Shastri worked
hard for this success. He was the General Secretary of the Congress at the
General Secretary of the Congress at the time. The selection of candidates
and the direction of publicity and electioneering were under the direct
guidance of Shastriji. But he did not contest the elections. However, Nehru
did not wish to leave such an able and honest man outside the government.
He persuaded him to seek election to the Rajya Sabha. He was elected to the
Rajya Sabha. He was appointed as the Railways and Transport Minister in the
Central Cabinet (1952).
The railways are among the biggest Central Government undertakings,
transport plays a vital role in the progress of any country. The railways in
India had been badly disrupted after the division of the country. Lal Bahadur
strove hard to set right and regulate the railways. It is not easy to organize
movement ofpassengers and good from place to place without waste of time
and without inconvenience. Lal Bahadur succeeded in this to a large extent.
There were four classes- first, second, intermediate and third in the railways
then. First class compartments offered extreme luxury and were almost
heavenly.But the discomfort ofpassengers in the third class compartments
was beyond description. They did not have even minimum comforts. Lal
Bahadur's efforts to reduce the vast disparitybetween the first and the last
classes cannot be forgotten. The first class that offered royal comfort was
abolished. The old second came to be known as the first class and the
intermediate class as the second class. His idea was to have only two classes
of compartments in course of time - the first and the second. It was he who
provided more facilities to travelers in third class compartments. It was
during his time that fans were provided in the third class compartments. He
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People used to call him the homeless Home Minister because he did not have
a house of his own. He had rented a small house in Allahabad. Even when he
was a minister, he used to stay in that house when he went to Allahabad.
After a few days the owner of the house let it out to another family. When
Shastriji resigned as minister he vacated the government quarters and he
did not have a place to line in!
The greatest danger that India had to face at the time was China's
aggression (1962). The Chinese army crossed the Himalayan border and
moved forward in wave after wave and occupied Indian territory in the north.
But India stood up like one man against China. The Chinese moved back. But
they did not return the areas they had occupied. China stabbed India in the
back and lost the friendship of India.
This was the time when China in the north and Pakistan both in the east and
the west started giving trouble to India. It was absolutely necessary that the
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people of India should forget internal quarrels and that they should unite like
brothers and sisters. Lal Bahadur Shastri strove hard to make the people feel
that they were all one.
The ruling Congress Party elected Lal Bahadur unanimously as its leader. He
did not show any interest in the discussions before the election of the leader.
He remained aloof as if it had nothing to do with him. The detachment he
showed then was surprising.
Lal Bahadur Shastri was the Prime Minister of India at a crucial time in India's
history. He was physically weak, but he faced the problems confronting the
nation like a hero. The first problem that he had to face after he became the
Prime Minister was one caused by Pakistan. Pakistan took shape by eroding
India's land, and was instigating Indian Muslims. After the Chinese
aggression, when India's confidence in her strength had been shaken,
Pakistan was creating trouble along the borders.
But Shastriji would not yield to the wickedness of Pakistan. He first tried to
earn the goodwill and support of other nations for India. He visited Russia,
Egypt, Canada and Britain and explained to the leaders of those nations
India's stand. He attended a meeting of the non-aligned nations (nations
which were neutral) and explained India's position. He even tried to reason
with President Ayub Khan of Pakisthan. The wicked do not like advice. They
can understand only one language, the language of war.
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It had become Pakistan's habit to provoke India somehow and jump to arms.
Pakisthan had been waiting to swallow Kashmir somehow. She pushed her
forces across the eastern border into the Rann of kuch in Gujarat State in
April-May of 1965. Lal Bahadur was not unnerved by this unexpected attack.
He faced the problem with great tact at that critical moment. The Indian
Army forced the attackers to retreat. Then both countries agreed to stop
fighting
But friendly words cannot tame a serpent. There is but one way to do it - to
remove the serpent's fangs.
Even before the ink with which they had signed the Kutch agreement dried
up, Pakisthan raised its hood to strike again. Pakistani soldiers entered
Kashmir in disguise. In September 1965 there was a large-scale invasion of
the territory by Pakistani soldiers in the Chhamb area. War broke out all
along the Cease-fire Line on the Kashmir border.
The enemies who had managed to enter Kashmir were cunning and
mischievous. Pakistan also tried to incite Indian Muslims. The Pakisthan army
was engaged in forcibly occupying areas, which belonged to India. There was
the danger of the fighting spreading to the eastern border also. In addition to
this, there was the threat posed by the Chinese on the northern borders of
India. Lal Bahadur Shastri faced all these problems with a will of iron. It was
at this time that the country understood the greatness of Lal Bahadur
Shastri. He decided that was the time to teach Pakistan a lesson. He gave full
freedom to the Commander of the Army. 'Go forward and strike' was
Shastriji's command to the generals.
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Fort: "It does not matter if we are destroyed. We will fight to the last to
maintain the high honor of the Indian nation and its flag."
Just at this time another danger threatened India. China sent a letter, which
said, "The Indian army has set up army equipment in Chinese territory. India
should pull down this equipment. Otherwise it will have to face the wrath of
China."
At that moment India was fighting against the Pakistani army equipped with
the latest weapons supplied in plety by the United States of America. And, at
this very moment how was India to resist China?
Even the big nations waited breathlessly to see what Lal Bahadur would say
and what India would do.
Lal Bahadur did not take long to give a reply. The letter from China was
received on the morning of 17th September 1965. He made a statement in
the Parliament the same afternoon. He declared: "China's allegation is
untrue. If China attacks India it is our firm resolve to fight for our freedom.
The might of China will not deter us from defending our territorial integrity."
India's soldiers had no fear of death and fought most splendidly and
heroically. The army and the air force functioned like the two arms of a single
body. The invaders were beaten. The Pakistani army could not stand against
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the Indian army. It was then that, for the first time, the world came to realize
the supremacy of the Indian army.
Some big nations feared that, if India won a total victory over Pakistan, it
would lower their prestige. The Security Council of the United Nations
Organization called on India and Pakistan to stop fighting.
Many people in India felt that we should not return the territory taken from
Pakistan- occupied Kashmir. They argued that the entire Kashmir belonged to
India. But Shastriji wished to give one more chance to Pakistan to live in
peace and friendship with India. So he signed the treaty of friendship.
Shastriji had suffered heart attacks twice before. And during the period of the
Pakistan war and the following days, his body, already battered, had to bear
a very heavy strain. He signed the joint Declaration on 10th January 1966.
He died the same night.
The news of Lal Bahadur Shastri's death struck India like a bolt from the blue.
The entire nation was plunged in grief. Some people suspected foulplay also.
Gone was the war hero and the messenger of peace, gone was the great
statesman who restored to India her honor and self- respect in the assembly
of nations. A tiny, tidy figure. A soul that had lived in perfect purity of
thought, word and deed. The very embodiment of selflessness, detachment
and simplicity. Such was this man who had lived in our midst. He belongs to
the race of the heroes of India.
Former Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri's son has demanded that the
government should unravel the mystery shrouding his father's death.
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Raising doubts about the dark blue spots and cut marks on the abdomen of
his father's body after his death in 1966,Shastri's son Sunil asked, When the
postmortem was not conducted, then how the cut marks appeared?
The government should clear all doubts about my father's death, he said at
a club function here.
After Shastri's death in Tashkent, USSR, on January 11, 1966 soon after
signing the Tashkent Pact with Pakistan, his wife Lalita had alleged he was
poisoned.
A query was later posed by Anuj Dhar, author of CIA's Eye on South Asia,
under the Right to Information Act about his death but the government had
refused to part with classified information on the issue.
The Prime Minister's Office, while refusing information under the RTI Act on
the cause and circumstances of Shastri's death, had said revealing these
details could harm India's foreign relations and would violate Parliamentary
Privilege.
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The Russian butler attending on Shastri at the time of his death was arrested
for suspected poisoning but released later.
Prime Minister's address at the inauguration of centenary year
celebrations of late Shri Lal Bahadur Shastri
October 2, 2004
New Delhi
Hindi Version
Respected Soniaji, Atalji, Gujralji, Jaipal ji
Friends,
humility, sincerity and simplicity enabled him to establish a deep bond with
people, and to easily strike a chord of understanding.
Mr. Lal Bahadur Shastri, Railway Minister, has tendered his resignation
following the Ariyalur train disaster. Announcing this in the Lok Sabha on
November 26, Prime Minister Nehru said he proposed to recommend to the
President to accept the resignation. "But I shall ask the Railway Minister to
continue his work for a few days till other arrangements can be made."
Earlier, Mr. Lal Bahadur Shastri told the House that the Government had
ordered a judicial enquiry into the rail disaster. He said the Railway Board
had initiated a survey of all railway bridges and catchment areas. Speaking
after Mr. Lal Bahadur Shastri, Mr. Nehru told the House that there might be
any number of explanations and possible excuses offered for this disaster,
but "in a matter of this kind, no excuse is good enough and the thing that
has moved all of us is that the same type of disaster should occur, broadly
speaking, in the same area or nearby twice within a short period and three
times in the course of a year or two. All of us are very unhappy over the
tragedy but I am sure - in fact I know it - that probably the unhappiest among
all of us is the Railway Minister."
Debates may rage on who was Indias best Prime Minister, but there can be
no question of who has been its most unjustly forgotten Prime Minister: Lal
Bahadur Shastri. This remains so even in this, the centenary year of his birth.
His memory was briefly exhumed on his hundredth birthday, 2 October 2004,
when, at a desultory function in Delhi, he was described by a Union Minister
as a devoted disciple of Mahatma Gandhi and a legendary loyalist of
Jawaharlal Nehru. And that, it appears, was the end of the commemoration
for the yearand perhaps for all time to come.
Shastri was both a disciple of Gandhi and an admirer of Nehru, but he was
also his own man. Born in Mughalsarai, in a Kayasth family of modest means,
he studied first with a maulvi and later at the Kashi Vidyapeeth. His
commitment to the nationalist cause came early, and remained steadfast. He
spent some nine years in jail (in seven stints) while working his way up the
Congress ladder. After Independence, he played a key role in organizing his
partys campaign in the first General Elections of 1952. He then served for
several years as Union Railway Minister, before resigning after a serious train
accident for which he felt he must own moral responsibility.
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Because of his small sizehe was barely five feet talland his self-effacing
nature, Shastri was consistently underestimated by all those around him
whether journalists, officials, or fellow Ministers. But one who properly
appreciated his qualities of head and heart was Jawaharlal Nehru. In 1961
Nehru brought Shastri back into the Cabinet. For the next three years he was
(as one contemporary put it) Indias premier compromiser, conciliator and
co-ordinatorthe most popular man in the Congress party and the main
channel of communication between Nehru and the party organizations.
Among the crises he solved at the Prime Ministers behest were those caused
by language riots in Assam and by the theft of a holy relic in Srinagars
Hazratbal mosque.
In and out of office, Lal Bahadur Shastri acquired a reputation for probity of
character unusual even in those generally honest times. When he was asked
to demit office under the Kamaraj Plain in 1963, Shastri wrote to an associate
of how, without a Ministers salary, his family had decided now to eat one
less vegetable every meal and to wash their clothes themselves.
When Nehru died Shastri was chosen by the Congress to succeed him. These
were difficult years, with the countrys morale affected by defeat in the war
with China, continuing tensions in the borderlands, and serious scarcities of
food. Shastri met these challenges with resolve and fortitude. He called for
the planners to lay a greater focus on agriculture, and himself supervised the
re-organization of the Indian Council of Agricultural Research. On the
industrial front, he rejected the prevailing export pessimism, arguing that
India had both the capital and the expertise to begin exporting chemical and
engineering products as well as traditional agricultural commodities such as
tea and rubber. (As it since has.)
Within a year of taking office Shastri had proved himself capable of filling
Jawaharlal Nehrus somewhat outsize shoesthis even Nehrus sister and
daughter were now willing to recognize. But one who persisted in
underestimating the little man was Field Marshal Ayub Khan of Pakistan. In
August 1965 Pakistani-backed infiltrators began fomenting trouble in the
Kashmir Valley. When Indian army units chased them back over the border,
Pakistan mounted a massive offensive in the Chamb sector of Jammu. The
enemy tanks rolled menacingly on. Now Shastri pulled off a master-stroke, by
asking the Indian Army to march into West Punjab. This at once relieved the
pressure on the Jammu sector and took Indian troops tantalizingly close to
the great city of Lahore. A cease-fire was called, to be followed by a peace
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agreement brokered by the Soviet Union, which mandated that both sides
pull back to the positions they had held before 5 August 1965.
His conduct during the 1965 War made Shastri a heroand justly so. His
character comes through best in two speeches he made, one at the onset of
the conflict, the other at its end. On the 13th of August, after the evidence of
mass infiltration into Kashmir had become manifest, the Prime Minister spoke
to the nation on All India Radio. Now that the countrys freedom and
sovereignty were threatened, he said, Indians must set aside their partisan
loyalties, those differences in policies and programmes that, in times of
peace, were such an essential part of our democratic set-up. And he issued
this stern warning to the other side: If Pakistan has any ideas of annexing
any part of our territories by force, she should think afresh. I want to state
categorically that force will be met with force and aggression against us will
never be allowed to succeed.
The other speech was made at a public meeting at the Ram Lila grounds in
Delhi on 26th September, after hostilities had ceased. Here he took issue
with a BBC report that claimed that since Indias Prime Minister Lal Bahadur
Shastri is a Hindu, he is ready for war with Pakistan. Shastri said that while
he was indeed a Hindu, Mir Mushtaq who is presiding over this meeting is a
Muslim. Mr Frank Anthony who has addressed you is a Christian. There are
also Sikhs and Parsis here. The unique thing about our country is that we
have Hindus, Muslims, Christians, Sikhs, Parsis and people of all other
religions. We have temples and mosques, gurdwaras and churches. But we
do not bring this all into politics. This is the difference between India and
Pakistan. Whereas Pakistan proclaims herself to be an Islamic State and uses
religion as a political factor, we Indians have the freedom to follow whatever
religion we may choose [and] worship in any way we please. So far as politics
is concerned, each of us is as much an Indian as the other. Like Jawaharlal
Nehru before him, Shastri upheld the idea of India as a multi-religious
country where politics and faith were kept in separate compartments.
However great the provocation, at least while he was around India would
never become a Hindu Pakistan.
Lal Bahadur Shastri died on the night of 10/11 January 1966, in the Uzbek
city of Tashkent, hours after signing a peace agreement with Pakistan. He
spent but nineteen months in office, enough to show himself to advantage as
a war leader. That, if at all, is how he is remembered today. But had he been
lucky to enjoy a full term in office his legacy might have been more wide145
ranging. For he had interesting and (to this writer) innovative ideas in the
fields of economic and foreign policy, among much else. He was keen to get
rid of the sloth and waste in government, and to induct talent from outside
one of his suggestions, unfortunately never implemented, was to have top
scientists inducted as Cabinet Ministers.
Lal Bahadur Shastri was a man of some considerable achievement and also,
being a politician, of the odd failure as well. This column has saluted the
achievements; the next one will highlight Shastris one serious failure as
Prime Minister.
And as expected, Pakistani media on Monday termed the meeting between
Manmohan Singh and Nawaz Sharif as a "minor miracle" and noted that the
dialogue held amidst a tense atmosphere yielded "words" but "no action',
reported PTI.
Earlier this year, you may recollect, how Pakistani soldiers indulged in a
barbaric act of beheading the body of two Indian army personnel. The
Central Govt. routinely assured the agitating nation to give a befitting reply
to Pakistani establishment, but cross border infiltration and terrorist attacks
continued regularly posing a serious threat to the national security. In such
moments of crisis, the absence of leaders like Lal Bahadur Shastri is felt with
greater intensity by the country.
Yes, today is 109th birth anniversary of countrys second prime minister, Lal
Bahadur Shastri who, for more than anything else, is always remembered not
only for his heroic leadership as far as teaching the real lesson to the then
Pakistani rulers during India- Pakistan war of 1965 is concerned but also for
his extraordinary initiatives to make the country stronger in many respects.
Please see how the modest looking Shastriji roared before 1965 war actually
begun.
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"If Pakistan has any ideas of annexing any part of our territories by force, she
should think afresh. I want to state categorically that force will be met with
force (Hathiyaron ka jawab hathiyaron se denge) and aggression against us
will never be allowed to succeed."
And, India won the war very decisively to the great surprise of all the
countries of the world including the super powers.
Lal Bahadur Shastri was born on 2nd October, 1904 at Mughalsarai near
Varanasi. His father was a school teacher who died when Lal was only one
year old. He spent his childhood in and around Varanasi. Lal Bahadur joined
Kashi Vidyapeeth and studied philosophy for four years and was awarded the
degree of Shastri in 1926.
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After the sudden demise of Nehru, Lal Bahadur Shastri became the Prime
Minister of the country. The time was very critical as the country was facing
all kinds of challenges including shortage of food. But, as a man of strong
will, dedication, commitment and integrity, he rose to the occasion like a true
statesman and made us proud by addressing major issues of the country.
Acknowledging and complementing the vital role of farmers and soldiers of
the country, he coined the famous slogan JAI JAWAN, JAI KISAN.
His views on some of the important issues as enumerated below give us the
opportunity to know and appreciate his perspective and his action oriented
personality:
Governance
"The basic idea of governance, as I see it, is to hold the society together so
that it can develop and march towards certain goals. The task of the
Government is to facilitate this evolution, this progress. It must provide
proper conditions and a proper climate for this purpose. While governing, the
administrator must, therefore, keep certain trends in view. He should be
aware of the policies which he has to implement and of the methods which
are open to him for their implementation. He should know what the
Government wants and at the same time be attuned to the needs of the
people".
Development
"The economic issues are most vital for us and it is of the highest importance
that we should fight our biggest enemies Poverty, unemployment. Whether
it is agriculture or industrial development, or for that matter, development in
other fields, the basic fact remains that it would serve the largest number
of our people".
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National Integration
"In this vast country of ours, people profess different religions, speak
different languages, dress differently and observe different customs; but we
are one nation; the history of our struggle for independence and our faith in
our future development are our common bonds".
"Among the major tasks before us none is of greater importance for our
strength and stability than the task of building up the unity and solidarity of
our people. Our country has often stood as a solid rock in the face of
common danger and there is a deep underlying unity which runs like a
golden thread through all our seeming diversity
On October 2nd, 1904 at Mughalsarai, seven miles from Kashi a little baby
boy was born to Sharada Prasad and Ramdulari Devi. They named him Lal
Bahadur Shastri.
Lal Bahadur's parents were agriculturists. Initially his father was a poor
teacher who did not earn much by way of income. Then he became a clerk in
the Revenue Office at Allahabad. Here, too, he earned very little. But, even
though he was poor, he never accepted bribes. He always lived a life of
honesty and integrity.
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When Lal Bahadur was only three months his Mother went to bathe in the
Ganga carrying him along. In the milling crowd at the bathing ghat she lost
the child. He had slipped from his mother's arms into a cowherd's basket.
The cowherd had no children, and he took baby Lal Bahadur to be a gift from
God and celebrated the event with great joy.
But his mother Ramdulari Devi was lost in grief. A complaint was lodged with
the police and they traced the child. The foster parents wept bitterly when
they had to give back the child.
Later in life, there was always a hilarious account of this incident where he
was teased "Lal Bahadur, who was destined to govern the country, narrowly
missed the 'good fortune' of becoming a cowherd".
But things were not happy for long. Tragedy struck the family when baby Lal
was just a year old. His father Sharada Prasad died. Ramdulari Devi was so
divested that she felt as though the skies had come down on her.
But luckily her father, Hazari Lal agreed to give her shelter. At that time she
had two more little girls apart from Lal Bahadur.
Lal Bahadur's grandfather Hazari Lal's family was very large. His brothers,
their wives and children, besides his own children and grand children, lived
under the same roof. It was a small world in itself and Hazari lal was the
fountain of love and affection to all of them. But he was especially fond of
little Lal Bahadur. He always affectionately called him 'Nanhe' which meant
'tiny'.
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Once when he was six years old, he went to an orchard with his friends. He
was standing below while his friends were climbing the trees. Lal Bahadur
plucked a flower from a bush in the garden.
The gardener came in the meantime and saw Lal Bahadur with the flower.
The boys on the trees climbed down and quickly ran away. But Lal Bahadur
was stunned and stood still. The gardener caught Lal Bahadur and beat him
severely.
Lal Bahadur wept and said, "I am an orphan. Please do not beat me."
The gardener smiled with pity and said, "Because you are an orphan, you
must learn better behavior, my boy.
The words of the gardener had a great effect on him. He swore to himself, "I
shall behave better in future. Because I am an orphan I must learn good
behavior."
Lal Bahadur stayed at his grandfather's house till he was ten. By that time he
had passed the sixth standard examination. There was no high school in that
place and since little Lal loved to study, his grandfather sent him to Kashi for
further education.
Courage and self-respect were two virtues, which took deep root in him from
his childhood. While in Kashi, he went with his friends to see a fair on the
other bank of the Ganga. On the way back he had no money for the boat
fare. His self-respect did not allow him to ask his friends for money. He
slipped from their company without their knowledge. His friends forgot him in
their talk and boarded the boat. When the boat had moved away, LaL
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Bahadur jumped into river and as his friends watched breathlessly, he swam
to the other bank safely.
Even as a boy Lal, loved to read books. He read whatever books he came
across, whether he understood them or not. He was fond of Guru Nanak's
verses.
"0 Nanak! Be tiny like grass; for other plants will whither away, but grass will
remain ever green."
Though he was short for his age he was not timid. All boys were friendly with
him. Like the grass he always looked fresh and smiling. Not only during his
school days but also in his later life he never did hate anyone.
He also loved acting in school plays. He played the role of Kripacharya in the
play 'Mahabharatha' and thoroughly enjoyed himself.
"Swaraj is our birth right" - Bal Gangadhar Tilak had declared. This had
become the nation's battle cry. Little Lal Bahadur revered Tilak.
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But the greatest influence on Lal Bahadur was that of Mahatma Gandhi. Lal
Bahadur was electrified when he heard a speech of Gandhi at Varanasi. Then
and there he decided to dedicate his life to the service of the country.
His mother and other relatives pleaded, "Nanhe, please don't give up your
studies."
But Lal Bahadur was firm in his decision. He did not go back to his school. He
became a student of Kashi Vidya Peeth. During his four years' stay there, he
made excellent progress. When he turned 22, he got the degree of 'Shastri'
and left the Kashi Vidya Peeth.
When Lal Bahadur was 23 years old he married Lalitha Devi, who hailed from
Mirzalyur. The wedding was celebrated in the simplest of ways. All that the
bridegroom took as a gift from his father-in-law was a charaka and a few
yards of Khadi!
Three years later, Mahatma Gandhi started the'' Salt Satyagraha'. Lal
Bahadur took a leading role in it i grid called on people not to pay land
revenue and taxes the government. On this account he was sent to prison for
two and a half years.
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From that time onwards, prison became his second home. He was sent to
prison seven times and was forced to spend nine long years in various
prisons different occasions.
Lal Bahadur's virtues shone even in the prison. He was an ideal prisoner. He
was a model to others in discipline and restraint. Many political prisoners
used to quarrel among themselves and they used to cringe for small favors
before the officials of the prison. But Lal Bahadur used to give up his
comforts for others.
Once when he was in prison, one of his daughters fell seriously ill. The
officers agreed to let him visit his daughter saying, We will let you out for a
short time but on the condition that you should give in writing that you will
not take part in the freedom movement during this period."
Lal Bahadur did not wish to participate in the freedom movement during his
temporary release from prison; but he replied, "I will not give it in writing.
But I shall not take part and I will return".
The officers knew that he was truthful and therefore they did not insist on a
written agreement. Lal Bahadur was released for fifteen days.
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But sadly his daughter died before he reached home. After performing the
final rites he returned to prison even before the expiry of the period.
He passed a year in the prison when news came to him that his son was laid
up with influenza. Lal Bahadur was permitted unconditionally to go home for
a week. But the fever did not come down in a week's time. Lal Bahadur got
ready to go back to prison. The boy pleaded dumbly with his tearful eyes.
In a weak voice he urged, "Father, please stay..." For a moment Lal Bahadur's
mind was shaken. Tears rolled down from his eyes. But the next moment his
decision was made. He bade good-bye to all and left his home for prison.
Luckily his son survived.
Thus, he brushed aside all thoughts of personal happiness and plunged into
the freedom struggle. His daughter's death, his son's illness, and poverty none of these made him swerve from his selected path.
Finally India got her freedom in 1947 when Lal Bahadur was 43. When
Govind Vallabh Pant became the Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh, Lal Bahadur
was appointed as Parliamentary Secretary to Pant.
Pant praised him and said, "I have never seen a more likable, hard-working,
devoted, trustworthy and a non-controversial man."
Later, in 1947, Lal Bahadur became the Minister f Police and Transport in
Pant's Ministry. He took many steps to bring discipline into the
administration. As a transport minister he subjected government buses to
discipline. He was the first to appoint women conductors.
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Also, Lal Bahadur never allowed the police to resort to lathi charge and firing.
He ordered them to use jets of water instead of lathis to disperse unruly
crowds. Though there were many strikes in Uttar Pradesh when he was in
office, there was not a single occasion when people shouted slogans against
him.
Lal Bahadur was also a lover of cricket. Once, when he was watching a match
at Kanpur, trouble broke out between the spectators and the Police. The
young men came to blows. Since Lal Bahadur was on the spot, the situation
did not go out of control.
The young men demanded," The red turbans (the police) should not be found
on the cricket ground tomorrow."
Lal Bahadur agreed to their wishes, but the police were there the next day.
The young men became angry with Shastri and protested.
Lal Bahadur laughed and said, "I fulfilled my promise to you faithfully. You did
not want red turbans to be here. You see the police are now wearing khaki
turbans." The spectators laughed and dropped the matter.
The railways in the country had ben badly disrupted after the division of the
country. Lal Bahadur strove hard to set right and regulate the railways. There
were four classes- first, second, intermediate and third in the railways then.
First class compartments offered extreme luxury and were considered
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Lal Bahadur made efforts to reduce the vast disparity between the first and
the last classes. The first class that offered royal comfort was abolished. The
old second came to be known as the first class and the intermediate class as
the second class. His idea was to have only two classes of compartments in
course of time - the first and the second. It was he who provided more
facilities to travellers in third class compartments that exists till date.
Lal Bahadur identified himself with the Railways so much that he felt he was
responsible if anything went wrong in his department. When he was the
Railway Minister, 144 passengers died in an accident that took place near
Ariyalur in Tamil Nadu. Just three months before this, an accident had
occurred at Mehboob Nagar in which 112 people died.
Lal Bahadur though was in no way responsible for these accidents, was very
much pained. He felt he could not escape the moral responsibility for them.
When the Mehboob Nagar accident took place, he submitted his resignation
letter to Pandit Nehru, who was the prime minister then. But Nehru did not
accept it.
But when the Ariyalur accident took place Shastri said, '"I must do penance
for this. Let me go." So strong was his sense of responsibility that he did not
care if he was losing a prestigious post.
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People used to call him the "homeless" Home Minister because he did not
have a house of his own. He had rented a small house in Allahabad where he
used to stay whenever he went to the city. But the owner of the house soon
let it out to another family. When Shastri resigned as minister he vacated the
government quarters and for some time he did not have a place to live in!
Then out of the blue, Nehru, the country's prime minister died on May 27,
1964. And the very next day the only question that echoed from Kashmir to
Kanyakumari was After Nehru, who?'
Finally all the leaders came to the decision that Lal Bahadur Shastri was the
only person responsible enough to pilot the nation. Thus he was elected the
Prime Minister of India, when he was 60 years of age.
The first problem that he had to face after he became the Prime Minister was
one caused by Pakistan. Pakistan started to create trouble along the Indian
border in order to capture Kashmir for itself.
Though he was physically weak, Shastri faced the 90 Great Lives - Leaders of
People problems confronting the nation boldly and wisely. He first tried to
earn the goodwill and support of other nations for India. He visited Russia,
Egypt, Canada and Britain and explalned to the leaders of those nations,
India's stand against Pakistan. He even tried to reason with President Ayub
Khan of Pakistan to settle down in peace. His efforts did pay off when both
countries agreed to stop fighting.
When Lal Bahadur was praised for his worthy efforts he just replied, "I am
just an ordinary man and not a very bright man."
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But Pakistan did not remain quiet for long. The Pakistani soldiers entered
Kashmir in disguise and were engaged in forcibly occupying areas, which
belonged to India. An enraged Lal Bahadur gave full freedom to the
Commander of the Army to go forth in war, "Go forward and strike. Force will
be met with force. It does not matter if we are destroyed. We will fight to the
last to maintain the high honour of the Indian nation and its flag."
The army and the air force functioned like the two arms of a single body
under Shastri's guidance and fought the war heroically. The invaders were
beaten. The U.N called on Lal Bahadur and Ayub Khan to sign a treaty of
friendship.
During the period of the Pakistan war and the following days, Shastri's body
was thoroughly battered by the heavy strain both mentally and physically. He
signed the joint Declaration on 10th January 1966.
Sadly, on the very same night he suffered a severe heart attack and died
instantly.
After his death the President of India conferred on him, on behalf of the
nation, the award of 'Bharat Ratna'.
And so was gone the tiny, tidy figure. A soul that had lived in perfect purity
of thought, word and deed. He never sought power. He never worked for it.
And yet power and authority came in search of him. Fame set a crown on his
head. The short man grew into a colossus and a leader who filled the Four
Corners of the world with the fame of India.
Hungarian airmail stamp on Lal Bahadur Shastri
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In early 1966 took the Tashkent conference of Indian and Pakistan with the
President of the Council of Ministers of the USSR, Comrade. Kosygin. The aim
of the conference was the establishment of mutual understanding between
India and Pakistan, what mediated conference organizer the Soviet Union.
The conference ended with complete success. The Indian delegation was led
by Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri, who died of a heart attack on Jan. 10,
1966 in Tashkent. In memory of this Indian statesman, a close ally of
Jawaharlal Nehru, the Hungarian Post released a stamp with his portrait.
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Postage stamps of Hungary for many years are of great interest among
collectors, especially the younger generation. Stamps of this country are
characterized, as a rule, an attractive theme, unpretentious but effective
graphics and careful printing, often in bright colors. Some philatelists accuse
the Hungarian-mail that almost every series she released simultaneously in
tooth and bezzubtsovom variants, which complicates their collection. In
general, however, the Hungarian stamps occupy many prominent collections.
Therefore, they should pay a little attention.
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THANK YOU
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