Indira Gandhi

by Nayantara Sahgal

  Lining the outer atmosphere of radical rhetoric, the tightening of the nuts and bolts of power continued. During the summer of 1971, the government made its first move towards control of the press when Mrs Gandhi’s own ministry of information and broadcasting prepared a draft scheme to ‘diffuse’ ownership of newspapers with a circulation of more than 15,000. This climaxed Mrs Gandhi’s bias, faithfully ref lected in her minister of state’s (Nandini Sathpathy) pronouncements about the ‘monopoly’ press. The draft scheme proposed that 95 per cent of a newspaper’s shares would be offered to journalists and other employees, and 5 per cent to existing shareholders. But each shareholder would exercise only half a vote per share, their combined voting rights amounting to 50 per cent. The remaining 50 per cent of voting rights on the management would go to a government appointee. The management would thus bear the final imprint of government authority and decisions.

  I expressed my views on the scheme:

  The worker will get a seat on the management but his voice will scarcely be heard… . What is only too plain is that if this proposal goes into effect it will systematically shatter not the bogy of ‘monopoly,’ but the reality of one of the healthiest, most stable institutions of our society.

  The most anguished cry against the scheme appeared in a three-column editorial in the Hindustan Times headed ‘ Freedom is in peril, Defend it with all your Might.’ B.G. Verghese, calling it ‘a monstrous perversion that will destroy the freedom of the press’, wrote:

  It amounts to a scheme of backdoor nationalisation and projects an extraordinary concept of workers’management that entails a unique separation of responsibility from control. It is astonishing that such an unworkable and destructive piece of legislation should be contemplated by a democratic government… . The whole exercise is a frightening warning that wild men enjoy wide rein within the administration … the Bill proposed by the government would … strike a deadly blow against the most vital aspect of the freedom of the press, namely the right of dissent and the duty to defy uninformed opinion brought out on the streets as a demonstration of ‘the will of the people… .’ The highest duty of a free Press is not to follow the mob but to lead it and educate it… . We would appeal to the Government, and to the Prime Minister in particular, to repudiate the vicious and undemocratic principles underlying this unworkable and incomplete draft scheme … which constitutes a diabolic attack not merely on the Press but on the citizen by seeking virtually to extinguish … the fundamental right to ‘freedom of speech and expression.’

  Verghese’ appeal ‘to the Prime Minister in particular’ was part of a genuine public belief that Mrs Gandhi herself was not directly associated with, or responsible for, authoritarian proposals or measures. The newspaper ‘diffusion’ scheme was drafted by the Secretary to the information and broadcasting ministry, R.C. Dutt, and the stinging backlash of criticism against it was absorbed by him and by the minister of state. Nandini Sathpathy, whose opinions on newspaper control had been forthright, had also been made responsible for answers about the control of film imports. Mrs Gandhi herself preserved a democratic image, remaining untouched at the centre of controversy, and could be appealed to whenever democracy appeared to be in danger—an oasis of moderation in the extreme views and proposals around her. During the midterm elections, she had portrayed the fighting radical, yet along with this she conveyed the image of a leader, centrist by instinct, and driven only by necessity to compromise with extremists. She maintained both images, which seemed to obscure the fact that each actual step she took embodied the extremist view. The ‘diffusion’ scheme struck at a 100-year-old tradition of intellectual vitality and individualism in Indian journalism, which had given the community respected and influential citizens. Its spirit of independence had flowered in opposition to British rule. Men like Verghese found themselves up against something new—a threat to freedom of expression from the Indian rulers of India. The reaction to it was strong. The scheme was adversely compared with Nehru’s attitude towards the press.‘I have no doubt that even if the Government dislikes the liberties taken by the press and considers them dangerous, it is wrong to interfere with the freedom of the press.’

  Nehru, inaugurating Shankar’s Weekly (of political satire and cartoons), had told Shankar, ‘Don’t spare me.’ Durga Das, head of India News and Feature Alliance, a leading syndicate, remarked, ‘Mrs. Gandhi does not accept the basic philosophy of a newspaper, that it has to convey the people’s problems, not the Government view, that a columnist must carry the voice of dissent to the corridors of power. It is the best safety valve a Government has. Her father understood that.’ A letter from Nehru to his sister, Mrs Pandit, in London, dated November 7, 1959, vividly conveys his response to press criticism during a time of tension between India and China:

  We are having a curious time here in India. People are worked up to a high pitch of excitement over the Chinese border issue. The principal newspapers here, which are opposed to our internal policies, have taken advantage of this to attack all our policies, internal and external, and to make me a target of attack. They dislike me for our internal policies and for trying to go too fast toward what they call socialism… . So you will observe that I am having a fairly interesting time!

  Commentators pointed out the total circulation of 755 dailies, variously owned, did not exceed 70 lakh, and government already exercised control through newsprint allocation and the supply and import of printing machinery. Mrs Gandhi was, therefore, perhaps disproportionately sensitive to the power of the press and the damage the ‘big’ newspapers could do if they disagreed with her.

  The measure was shelved as opinion against it rose to a crescendo, and government’s understanding of fundamental rights remained unexplained. A religious trust in the south took the issue, relating to its property, to the Supreme Court. In October 1972 the fundamental rights became the subject of a debate before a thirteen-member bench of the Supreme Court.

  Mrs Gandhi’s hold on party members, including senior ministers, and her ability to ease them out of long-occupied berths came from her use of the intelligence apparatus at her command. The deeper currents she manipulated in men and money came to light by accident through the Nagarwala affair.2

  On May 24, 1971 Ved Prakash Malhotra, chief cashier of the State Bank of India, received a phone call instructing him to deliver Rs 60 lakh in cash to a man who would identify himself as Bangladesh ka Babu (Man from Bangladesh) on a road in New Delhi. The call, Malhotra later told the police, came from the prime minister. Taking a taxi, he delivered the money as instructed and hurried to the prime minister’s house to report the completion of his mission. The prime minister’s Principal Secretary, P.N. Haksar, who met him, denied absolutely that Mrs Gandhi had made the call and advised the astonished Malhotra to go to the police immediately. The money was recovered on the same day. Captain Nagarwala, the man who had taken delivery of it from Malhotra, seemed to have left an open, easy trail for the police to find and arrest him. He confessed he had wanted the money for support to Bangladesh and had impersonated the prime minister’s voice to obtain it.

  Nagarwala’s case was conducted in a highly unorthodox manner and with record speed. In three days, three different magistrates dealt with it. On the third day, May 27, he was sentenced to four years’ imprisonment and a fine of Rs 4000. The police did not produce as evidence in court the tape they said they had taken of Nagarwala’s impersonation, and Nagarwala’s account of it was very different from Malhotra’s earlier account. Malhotra was not examined in court.

  On the day of Nagarwala’s arrest, Opposition MPs demanded an answer in Parliament to the question: Had the prime minister spoken to Malhotra on the telephone? A member, drawing attention to her sudden exit from the House, was sternly reprimanded by the Speaker and told to ‘desist from making any allegations’. The uproar raised by New Congress benches prevented a discussion.

  Malhotra, arrested after Nagarwala had been convicted, clung to his story. He wept, in
sisting he had only obeyed the prime minister’s instructions. Nagarwala, docile and cooperative enough until his conviction, seemed to have second thoughts in jail, showing signs of disillusion and despair. He appealed for retrial, saying his trial had been rushed through, contrary to all principles of justice, and asked that Malhotra’s story be fully investigated first. This request was refused, though a retrial was ordered. In November Nagarwala tried to get an interview with D.F. Karaka, editor of the Bombay weekly Current and a fellow Parsi. Karaka, too ill to travel to Delhi, sent a representative, but Nagarwala would speak to no one else. In February he was removed to hospital, reportedly complaining of a pain in the chest. He died on March 2, 1972. In the army before Independence, Rustam Sohrab Nagarwala is believed to have been employed as an intelligence officer in RAW at this time.

  The case was closed. The money was returned to the bank. Malhotra was dismissed. He later appeared on the Delhi scene as owner of a transport operation and fully supported the official version of the story. The prime minister’s role in the affair remained a mystery. Had she spoken to Malhotra on the telephone? Could Malhotra carry Rs 60 lakh out of the bank on receipt of a phone call unless there were some precedents for it?

  The public had other questions: Was Nagarwala made a scapegoat when Haksar (unaware of the arrangement) inadvertently exposed it by sending Malhotra to the police? What use was made of funds such as these, so casually removable from the vaults of a bank? Had Nagarwala died a natural death? Had D.K. Kashyap’s death been accidental? Kashyap, assistant superintendent of police, the officer most closely connected with the investigation, had died in a car collision on Grand Trunk Road near Mathura on November 20, 1971.

  The code phrase in the Nagarwala affair had been ‘Bangladesh ka Babu’, and events across the East Bengal border were, along with her consolidation of control over the Congress party machine, Mrs Gandhi’s chief preoccupation in 1971. The Opposition closed its ranks solidly behind her when, on March 31, she moved a resolution in both Houses of Parliament expressing ‘… deep anguish and grave concern at the recent developments in East Bengal’. High tension and suspicion had developed between East and West Pakistan, resulting in widespread and ruthless suppression of public opinion and dissent. This led to a popular movement in East Bengal for independence and secession from Pakistan. Sympathy for the stream of refugees becoming a flood of millions was mixed with alarm at the severe strain they were imposing on India’s resources, and the danger to stability in West Bengal, always a vulnerable region.

  If for a time Mrs Gandhi seemed robbed of initiative, her announcement of the Indo-Soviet Treaty of Friendship and Cooperation, signed in New Delhi on August 9, put a stop to all such conjecture. In keeping with her government’s style, which did not include open discussion or parliamentary debate about issues affecting the country, the treaty was presented as an accomplished fact. Consummate showmanship marked its announcement at a rally at India Gate, New Delhi’s most spectacular vantage point and scene of Republic Day parades. At another time its full implications would have provoked more thought. In essence a security-based alliance, it represented a complete reversal in foreign policy, while its other clauses would intimately and diversely affect internal affairs. But, in the tension and anxiety caused by events in East Bengal, it spelled relief for India, for the first time since Independence provided with a powerful ally in case of war. Coming upon the official indifference of most governments to the tragedy of genocide across the border (there were notable exceptions, whose support, however, did not count in the international power game), the partisan pro-Pakistan policy of America, and the grave danger to which India felt exposed, the treaty came at the psychological moment when it would find an enthusiastic welcome. Very few were concerned in this context with analysing the extent to which it brought India’s defence, economy and culture under Soviet influence and pressure for the next fifteen years. Those who attempted analysis were denounced as unpatriotic.

  Mrs Gandhi was able to go abroad at the end of September, cushioned by the treaty, to try to rouse heads of governments to the calamity on the subcontinent. The prime minister abroad exhibited a normality and balance she lacked at home, though she carried her annoyance at Indian critics with her and displayed it on occasion. Speaking to the Society for Foreign Policy and International Relations in Austria, she said, ‘In our fifth general election last March, 152 million people went to cast their votes, in spite of the fact that … there was great deal of mischievous and false propaganda about our policies and programmes.’ In the Soviet Union, she said, ‘There are some, in India and abroad, who are trying to misinterpret its [the treaty’s] meaning and purpose.’ At President Nixon’s banquet for her, she spoke of ‘the people’ as distinct, by implication, from those who opposed her, ‘So the campaign became not a campaign of a political party, but a campaign of the people … people came to the fore and said, “If this is a candidate belonging to Mrs. Gandhi’s party, we will make him win.”’

  The efficient conduct of the Indo-Pakistan war of 1971 was both a balm and a stimulant to a nation humiliated by the Chinese in 1962 and, in the hope of peace, persuaded into an indeterminate conclusion with Pakistan in the war of 1965. Mrs Gandhi’s handling of this period of crisis and danger, during the tense months preceding the war, and the war itself, illustrate that, when reality had to be faced, when it could not be obscured by rhetoric or enveloped by the slide and slither of innuendo, she could come to grips with it. In the process and through the war, Mrs Gandhi attained the recognizable leadership that continued to elude her in her inability to come to grips with daily realities on the home front. The unilateral ceasefire she declared immediately on Pakistan’s collapse in East Bengal was an act of statesmanship. Her broadcast announcing the war’s end was quiet and calm and had the added grace of restraint in victory, a restraint she had not been able to exercise after her election victory at home. The two fronts, external and internal, continued divided. Precise, if ruthless and insensitive action, marked Mrs Gandhi’s style in her incorporation of Sikkim into the Indian Union. A pattern of cordial relations began to be efficiently established with neighbours. Wounds with Pakistan began to be healed and ties resumed. China and India reopened full diplomatic relations. Yet, at home, a state of ‘war’, narrow unyielding, and locked in inconsistencies, went on. Neither concession nor discussion had any part in Mrs Gandhi’s politics at home.

  A news conference on December 31, 1971 warmly congratulated Mrs Gandhi on her leadership through the Bangladesh crisis and directed its questions at the war’s aftermath, the future with Pakistan and the safety of Mujibur Rahman. The dazzle of a victory, this time a military one, once again left its deeper implications unexplored. India’s role in bringing it about had meant an involvement far beyond any yet undertaken in foreign affairs. The Indian army, along with Bangladesh, had taken the Pakistani surrender. The massive Soviet support that had made this possible meant the end of non-alignment and brought India into the politics of competitive power. The long-term effects on Bangladesh did not take long to appear.

  The direction now taken by foreign policy was partly the result of America’s policies in Asia and more recently its stand on Bangladesh. But it coincided, too, with Mrs Gandhi’s leap to individual recognition in 1969 and her consolidation of her position thereafter.

  The CPI, until it became Mrs Gandhi’s ally in 1969, had enjoyed little credit or credibility in Indian politics. Founded in 1925, it had 100 members in 1933. Banned by the British government, it struggled for survival during the Stalin years, when revolution outside the Soviet Union found little besides moral support. Between it and the peasant-worker masses stood the figure of Mahatma Gandhi, a 100 per cent Indian obstruction, clasping India to him through religion, tradition and continuity, recognizing no class distinctions, and piloting a movement for freedom that did not tolerate violence. The CPI lost further ground with World War II, when an ‘imperialist’ war became, with the Soviet entry into it, a ‘peop
le’s’ war and enlisted the CPI’s full cooperation. The mood and tide in India were fiercely nationalist, and Congress leaders were put in jail for refusing to participate in the Allied war effort unless India’s freedom was granted. After Independence, Nehru’s position in the ruling party and the country could not be upset by conspiracy or manipulation. He invited the cooperation of all ‘socialists’ but he did not need political allies. Mrs Gandhi did. The Soviet Union’s interest in the CPI–New Congress alliance was not one of ideology. Mrs Gandhi’s struggle for power in her party was backed by the Soviet Union for more important considerations. There were giant global considerations in the balance. With the birth of a new country, Bangladesh—blessed by India and the Soviet Union—and with the enfeebling of Pakistan, a bloc encompassing the land mass from the Soviet Union to the Indian Ocean could become a reality. In Mrs Gandhi, there was an Indian leader of the style and temperament required to play with great flair the game of power.

  At Mrs Gandhi’s news conference, no reference was made to the new law, Maintenance of Internal Security Act (MISA), passed in June 1971, giving the government ‘deterrent power against antisocial elements’ and providing for arbitrary arrest and imprisonment without trial for six months. The Emergency (against external danger), declared when the war broke out in December, remained in force, although by mid-1972 the Simla Agreement had been signed, and relations between India and Pakistan had never been more cordial or promising.