Gandhi scripted the most magnificent uprising known to man by a simple truth: first, conquer the self; then, the state. The British couldn’t touch him. He defeated them morally before he did so politically. Yet, his was a melancholic end. He couldn’t prevent Partition. His colleagues stopped paying heed; they were too caught up in running governments. The Sardar [Patel] was six years younger to Gandhi, Jinnah seven, the Maulana [Azad] 19, Nehru 20, Ambedkar 22 and [Subhas] Bose 28. They were worlds apart. The rightwing hated him, the liberals ignored him. One evening, Gandhi was assassinated by those he always sought to work with. The world had no use for innocence after Auschwitz. India had no place for honour after Partition. Gandhi endured, India adapted. And so the greatest Indian passed the saddest. There was no glory for the Sardar either as his story wound down. He constructed a country out of egos and kingdoms. He knew no fear; he had steel where others had nerves. But, when the buck stopped, Gandhi chose Nehru instead. The Sardar stayed the deputy. They say he couldn’t forgive himself after the Gandhi murder. He was the country’s home minister. It wasn’t enough. There were far too many plots; one of them worked. The Sardar died two years after Gandhi. Even in memory, he is under the radar. Ambedkar, the great reformer, saw more wrong than right with India in his sunset. He smashed prejudice in a way totally different from Gandhi. He put together the Constitution of India, the nation’s Holy Book since. He crafted a blueprint for what is now the Reserve Bank of India. He dignified India in everything he did. But he knew no inner peace. He hated how Nehru seemed to give in too easily on Kashmir. He refused to second Article 370. He hated the yardstick of caste. He thought ten years of reservation would change things. It didn’t. His inner rage needed soothing. Ambedkar thought a change of religion might help. It didn’t. He is in many ways the greatest Indian after Gandhi. But he passed bitter. India did not match Ambedkar in grace. It waited 34 years after he died to say he is a Bharat Ratna. Nehru, the great prime minister, barely had anything going at the end. He was the star of the greatest political team ever to have lived – a galaxy of luminaries led by Gandhi. He told the world there was a third path that neither led to the US nor to the [then] USSR. They called it NAM [Non-Aligned Movement] but it was simply the political equivalent of ESP. Nehru saw things others couldn’t. Yet, he lost a war to China. They say his heart wasn’t in it afterward. His offer of special status to Jammu and Kashmir triggered a host of negatives. Things began to sour. Nearing 75, he at times needed help to walk. India no longer gave him as much as he gave to India. China stripped him off the global halo he had before 1962. The Sardar, the Maulana and Ambedkar were long gone. Nehru’s misery ended with a heart attack.
Posted on: Mon, 29 Dec 2014 23:36:07 +0000
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