It was an
accidental meeting.
First he
avoided looking into my eyes and turned away. We had known each other for more
than 2 decades and there was no way he would not have noticed me. I kept on
looking at him. The next time he looked at me I smiled. He gave me a sheepish smile. Then after I made enquiries about his health,
he slowly started speaking.
Now a days
I find from your social media posts that you have developed a very negative
opinion about our party.
Yes.
But you
appeared to be supportive of our ideas and leaders when we were in the opposition
and even when Vajpayeji was the PM.
Yes. When
you were in the opposition, Congress had already hit its nadir. Their leaders were not connected at the
ground level. They had already
compromised on those values for which the party stood for prior to
Independence. In fact Gandhi wanted the winding up of the party after
Independence. He foresaw the possibility
of the party taking the credit for achieving freedom and thus destroying
democracy.
Do you mean
to say that Gandhi was a democrat?
As an
individual, he was not. He always gave
importance for his inner voice. But in governance, he was insistent that it
should be democratic.
Then how do
you explain his interfering with the elections in Congress itself?
When his
opinion and support was sought he took the stand that he could not go with someone
whose path he had no trust in. He was outside the Congress. The leaders of the Congress required him.
That was it.
But how
does all this come in the way of your present opposition to our party?
Because,
after 2014, your party has openly taken to the path that was earlier followed
by the Congress under Mrs. Gandhi.
How was
Mrs. Gandhi different from her father?
Her father,
in spite of his weaknesses, which he himself would admit here and there, would
not like to stick to power at any cost.
Rather, he felt being in power was a burden. I remember to have read somewhere that this
was primarily why Gandhi preferred him to Patel. Nehru himself is believed to
have issued a pamphlet using a pseudonym
against himself and describing himself as a dictator, to avoid being re-elected
President of the Congress.
It could
have been a lie circulated to bring credit to himself.
But then,
he was always concerned about criticism.
He wanted to be seen as a follower of Gandhian principles and a world
leader. Partly only because of this he
failed to see through the Chinese game plans.
Mrs. Indira
Gandhi was also sensitive to criticism.
Yes. She
inherited it from her father. But, she lacked his confidence. Hence, sought to reduce the stature of others
of her father’s generation. When she
found that she was left without the footing of that generation, she sought to
get a firm footing of her own, through nationalization and then she gained
better control after the Bangladesh war.
Yes. But
for her we may not have won that war.
If Sashtri
had been there also we could have won.
Now, we have the habit of trying to put down Nehru with the success in
Pakistan war and Bangladesh war. It is
preposterous to speak about Bangladesh and China in the same breath. But the point is that even after getting an
unassailable position after the Bangladesh war, she constantly was wary of the
opposition, within the Congress and outside, which ultimately lead to the
Emergency.
But how do
you blame us of following her footsteps?
You are well aware that we were the ones who fought against the
emergency. The Communist fellows cowed
down meekly.
Yes. Some of your leaders and cadre fought against
the emergency. Some in the Communist
party also. But some of your people also had a soft corner for her because, she
was openly showing pro-Hindu leanings.
Her son, Sanjay was a great fan of your theories of ‘teaching the
Muslims a lesson or putting them in place’.
The present bulldozer culture of some of your state governments reminds
me of only the Turkman gate incidents.
But we are
staunchly against dynasty politics.
When you
propound a Hindu rashtra, which is unquestionably linked to varnashrama and has
become embedded as caste system, how do you say dynasty could be done away
with?
But some
families have been looting the country like the Gandhi family at the centre,
the Abdhullahs in J&K and the Karunanidhi family in TN.
But in
these 10 years, have you been able to bring them to book? Atleast establish primafacie cases? During
the UPA you made such a big din about the 2G that you have not been able to
establish the case in the last 10 year of your rule. I do agree that a hand
full of people or families amassing wealth is bad for the economy and
democracy. Whether it is a ruling clan
or a corporate body. A democracy with vibrant institutions like the legislature,
Judiciary and press should ensure that such things do not happen. For that matter, have not the second
generation already started coming up in your party? Then how can you blame the banyan called the
Congress or similar old parties? And
whether Congress or your party or others, there is open alignment with the corporates.
Do you not see
that we have been bringing legislations to ensure a curb on corruption?
I find that
your legislations are mostly to serve your own party than to bring long term
solutions to the real problem.
How do you
say that?
Demonitisation,
PM CARES Fund, Electoral Bonds, Change in committee to appoint Election
Commissioners by giving the entire power to the PM with 2/3 strength, attempts
to change the collegium system so that similar exercise could be done in the
matter of appointing Judges, etc are purely for putting your selves on a higher
footing from the others so that the level playing field is taken away. I am reminded about someone like Mr.
Gurumurthy saying that in order to win more medals in the Asiad or Olympics, we
should include those games in which we are better at. That is precisely what
your party has been doing in terms of legislations. Bringing in your own rules of the game or
game itself. The next in your agenda is to go in for delimitation by which the
south and east will become irrelevant for your majority, because, these regions
think differently.
You are
questioning the competence of the elected party with a majority to make laws.
Laws have
to be made in continuation to the earlier ones.
Just because I have a majority I cannot rubbish all the earlier events
or legislations and create something out of the blue. That will destroy the concept of ‘rule of
law’. That is what anarchy is about and how people like Hitler liked to
interpret democracy.
But this so
called ‘rule of law’ has been inherited from the British. Why should we hang on
to it?
Many of the
present day laws have been continued from the British. But even when British
made laws which were against our interest, there have been protests, often
violent, against them. Thus, it is an
evolution that has taken place. To say
that we will repeal all that has been done from the British period is to go
back to Sati, non-marriage of widows, non-inheritance of property by women, untouchability,
etc.
We want to
go back to the golden age of our ancestors where these discriminations were not
there. It is the British and left
historians who portrayed as if these were there in the Hindu society.
First of
all, there is no proof that man ever lived without discriminations, in one form
or the other. Secondly, clock cannot be
set back in time. Third, there are enough recordings by our own people
regarding such bad practices and from time to time there have been attempts to
reform from within. Putting all the
blame ofn the British will not cut much ice.
Lastly, even if such an ambition is genuine, the tone and tenor of your
present leadership is not promising in that regard.
How do you
make such a bland and blanket statement? You are biased.
Yes. I have
become biased because I saw that even after being elected to power, you keep on
speaking as if you are in the opposition.
Your tallest leaders speak the language of regional party leaders or
even leaders of some splinter groups or pressure groups. You people have forgotten that once elected,
you have to speak and act on behalf of all people. Not ‘your people’ alone.
But every
other party which gets elected, works only for their supporters. You are proposing an utopian theory.
Agreed. In
practice, it had been so. But in public
and while speaking and acting in capacities of elected posts, people were
expected to behave according to their positions. That is why I have not had any objection to
Vajpayee, but do not accept Mrs. Gandhi.
Now you are
coming back to the same thing. I think
there is no point in talking to you. You
cannot be convinced.
Yes, I
would better not be.
That is why
I avoided speaking to you. After the next elections, people of your type will
either change or will be forced to.
After he
left, I was left ruminating:
I was
reminded of what Kuldip Nayar wrote in his book on the Emergency (The
Judgment). While waiting for the train
just before the election results were to be announced (in 1977) he says,
suddenly a thought flashed in his mind, ‘what if she comes back’?.
I would
better believe in God.
