THIS ABOVE ALL
Rajiv failed as PM
Khushwant Singh

On Friday, August 20, all the six daily papers I get were full of paid ads, paying tributes to Rajiv Gandhi on his birth anniversary (August 20, 1944). He was a handsome young man, and very photogenic. He deserved to be remembered as he was assassinated by Sinhalese Tamilian terrorist while doing his duty. What baffled me was why this year, page after page, was devoted to his memory, which was much more than was done in the intervening years.

I came to the conclusion that these ads were primarily to draw the attention of Sonia Gandhi, as good looking as her husband, and her son Rahul, who resembles his parents. The two of them have put new life into the Congress, which is in ascendance, while all the Opposition parties are on the decline. These advertisers wanted to ensure they would not be overlooked at the next general election. They are plain and simple matlabis (patronage seekers).

Let us take a took at Rajiv Gandhi’s record as Prime Minister. He took over from his mother, who was assassinated by her Sikh bodyguards in the morning of October 31,1984. Hindu-Sikh relations had been fouled by the hateful utterances of Bhindranwale, and crimes committed by his gangsters. The situation needed firm handling. But Rajiv was a greenhorn in politics, and sought advice on how to act. One of his closest advisers advised him to "teach the Sikhs a lesson." So instead of going out in the streets and pacifying angry mobs of Hindus, as his grandfather Jawaharlal Nehru had done in 1947 to stop the massacre of Muslims in Delhi, he let the Lieutenant-Governor of Delhi order the police not to intervene when Hindu mobs were attacking Sikhs. They killed several thousand innocent Sikhs and looted their property.

Rajiv Gandhi let the Lieutenant-Governor of Delhi order the police not to intervene when Hindu mobs were killing innocent Sikhs in 1984. By contrast, Rahul and his mother Sonia have not slipped even once. My guess is that after the next general election, Sonia and Rahul will move from 10 Janpath to Race Course Road, and Manmohan Singh and Gursharan Kaur from Race Course Road to Rashtrapati Bhavan

He mishandled the Shah Bano case; he allowed Hindus to install idols in a portion of Babri Masjid. He sensed things had gone wrong, and worked to mend matters. He called a meeting of about a dozen MPs and asked his Home Minister Buta Singh whether the families of the victims of the massacre had been rehabilitated. Buta Singh assured him that all had been rehabilitated. I contradicted him, and named Charanjit Singh, who had not yet got compensation. Rajiv ordered his Finance Minister to look into the case. The next day he received full compensation.

Rajiv had promised to clean up the Ganga. It is now dirtier than before. He was a failure as Prime Minister. It was many years later that his wife Sonia Gandhi made Parliament pass a resolution, apologising to the nation for the massacre of 1984.

By contrast, Rahul Gandhi and his mother Sonia have not slipped even once. Rahul Gandhi stormed into the citadels of the Opposition like the Shiv Sena in Mumbai and Mayawati in Uttar Pradesh to become the sole leader of the Dalits. My guess is that after the next general election, there will be a change of addresses. Sonia and her son Rahul will move from 10 Janpath to Race Course Road, and Manmohan Singh and Gursharan Kaur from Race Course Road to Rashtrapati Bhavan.

Poetry and civil service

A couple of years ago, I introduced my readers to Sumita Misra, IAS, now a senior officer in the Haryana Government, by publishing a poem written by her. A collection of her poems is soon being published in Chandigarh. I take the liberty of publishing one entitled Evening Walk to let you judge the quality of her work:

To assemble life’s jigsaw;

Slowly, bit by bit;

With misshapen pieces;

That don’t quite fit;

To balance the dead weight;

Of each insistent day;

With the weight of gossamer;

Dreams that refuse to go away;

To stride with the wind;

And breathe in the colours of spring;

Knowing that you may never;

Like those homing birds take wing;

These, or similar, are tales untold;

Each life has a secret story;

Whose living is courage itself;

More real than any fable of glory.

Four ‘hs’ of life

There are 4 ‘hs’ where a person spends his time at one stage or the other in life — home, hostel, hotel and hospital.

(Courtesy: KJS Ahluwalia, Amritsar)

Follow your papa

A boy went to see a cabaret dance. His mother got angry and asked him: "Did you see anything there that you should not have seen?"

Boy: "Yes, I saw dad there."

(Contributed by JP Singh Kaka, Bhopal)