Bharatbhai R Pandya: 2018

Friday, October 26, 2018

Life of the wealthy billionaires of South Delhi

A hilarious account of life in South Delhi. There are glimpses shocking reality. All this is Jaitly and Sibal crowd.
Written by a retired IAS officer.

South Delhi is where most of Delhi’s multi millionaires live and where the least amount of Income Tax is collected. Its residents, therefore, are naturally in a mood to celebrate all the time by throwing dinner parties with all these tax savings. Now, I don’t get invited very often because I’m an ardent Kejriwal supporter and – let’s face it – millionaires consider him a pustule on the backside of history. But my wife is more politically correct and better connected through her Facebook account so I do manage to slink into a dinner or two occasionally. I have found the experience fascinating.

Lets begin with the time line. Nobody – but NOBODY- ever arrives at a dinner on time: to do so ensures you will never be invited again. Such aberrant behaviour reveals more about you than a petri-dish does about a virus in Dr. Lal’s Pathlab. It indicates, for example, that you are unemployed or (God forbid) retired, that you have no other place to visit that evening, that you are trying to save on the AC charges in your own home, that you are unimportant flotsam. Unfortunately, I ALWAYS arrive at the appointed hour indicated by the host. Its a Pavlovian response, brought on by the fact that, having spent all my formative years in hostels where one never knew when or from where the next meal was coming, one was always on time at the feeding trough, nose-bag ready. In South Delhi, however, if the card says 9.00 PM it usually means midnight. So, while the host and hostess (or bride and bridegroom) are still getting dressed, I usually spend my time chatting with the vassals or patting the pooch or listening to Arnab Goswami doing to politicians what the rooster normally does to the hen. Its a bit boring, but it does build up a healthy appetite.

The conversation. There are no Oscar Wildes or Chestertons or even Groucho Marxs in South Delhi, so don’t expect to be edified or elevated at any stage. There are plenty of jokes, though – usually about Kejriwal and Rahul Gandhi – but most of the conversation is about income tax raids on friends, I Phone models, Kamini Jha and Barbara (beauticians whose ministrations are di rigeur before a South Delhi aunty can even consider stepping out of the house, even for a funeral), the trip to Angkor Vat, property prices in Gurgaon (there is no more land left in Delhi except the Yamuna flood plains but that is reserved for that great environmentalist Sri Sri Ravishankar), or the latest Godman who is milking them dry.

There is, however, a major problem in initiating a conversation with someone. One never knows who is married to whom. It would be a mistake to assume that the couple you met at the last dinner is still a couple: chances are that they have now become two singles or a mixed double or even part of a triple. The cognoscenti always skirt this area in the peroration but, having been married for 39 years (to the same woman, by God!) I always lead with my chin. My breaking-the-ice conversation usually goes like this:

ME : Hullo, Mr. Ramani, how’s the charming Mrs. Ramani ?
HIM: Oh, she’s Mrs. Kapoor now.
ME : Oh, I’m delighted-uhh, sorry- to hear that. But wasn’t Mr. Kapoor your best buddy?
HIM : He still is. After all, he’s married to my wife, you know.

At this point I usually wander off to the bar where life is simpler and the conversation (and smart phone video grabs) are usually about Sunny Leone: nothing complicated there, for what you see is what you don’t get!

The food served at these dinners is distinctly anti-national if not seditionist, because there is nothing Indian about it. No beef is served, of course (the chef may be a closet Gau Bhakt), but all endangered species of meat, fish and fowl grace the table. The South Delhi elite is genuinely globalisesd – bank accounts in Cayman islands, companies in Panama, residences in London, weddings in Paris, holidays in Venice, shopping in New York–why then should the cuisine be Indian?

Indian cuisine in all its forms has been given the quietus – Mughlai, Avadhi, Punjabi, Hyderabadi, Goan, Malabari: they are all passe now. The delicious Kashmiri dishes are a no-no these days as serving them amounts to supporting the separatists. In fact, even Mr. Modi’s “Look East” policy appears to be floundering: our initial affairs with Asian cuisines – Chinese( Szechuan, Cantonese and Ludhianvi), Japanese and Thai – have given way to a full blown passion for French cuisine these days. But South Delhi has, as usual, got it all wrong. French cuisine is broadly divided into three styles, the oldest being the Classique, then the Haute and the most recent being the Nouvelle. France itself has gone back to the older first two in recent years but we persist with the Nouvelle of which, I’m sure, Vir Sanghvi would strongly disapprove. The logic for it, however, is indisputable: if the nouvelle-rich will not serve nouvelle – cuisine then who will ? (The Italian cuisine is still holding out, however- barely-just like the Congress party, and hoping to make a similar come-back along with the Gandhis).

As any chef, or reader of Vir Sanghvi, knows, the emphasis in Nouvelle is on the presentation – the food itself can taste like a dog’s breakfast (and usually does) but the table-ware and arrangement of the food on the plates would make Camelot look like Parathe-wali Gali. The salads resemble a patch of the Amazon rain forest, the consomme (they don’t call it soup in these francophone days) is as translucent as a Kim Kardashian dress, the meats so life-like you expect them to walk (or fly, or swim) off the table any moment, and the trays of multi hued sauces/dips/dressings/ condiments resemble Michaelangelo’s palette just before he flung himself at the Sistine chapel. Its usually a grand spectacle, and everyone goes back home delighted and hungry as hell.

Of course, it goes without saying that everything (or at least all that is visible) has to be imported, including the liquor. South Delhi guests give short shrift to anything local. I once met this Croesus-like real estate magnate at a dinner who was loudly informing the humbler five-bedroom types about his recent toe nail operation: “And then the Doc told me he would operate with a local anesthetic. Local, can you believe it?! Nothing doing, Doc, I told him, get an imported one or I go to Monte Carlo for the operation!” He is currently being de-nailed and defanged by the Supreme Court, without any anesthesia, of course.

The most important ingredient–the Guest List. South Delhi dinners are not meant to feed the hungry: they are a power statement, and therefore conform to an informal set of Do’s and Don’ts which, after years of hanging around with the minions, I have managed to figure out. The important points

§ You HAVE to invite Arun Jaitley.

§ If you invite Arun Jaitley DO NOT invite Subramaniam Swamy.

§ If Mr. Jaitley is there then you should also invite your Income Tax Commissioner and the Director Enforcement. They will get the message (if not the evaded tax). Virbhadra Singh didn’t invite them and look where he is now.

§ At least three of your guests should have either a Rolls or a Bentley. Remember, the neighbours are watching! Audis and BMWs are out – everybody in Gurgaon has (a restored!) one.

§ ALWAYS invite at least one lawyer, one doctor, one physiotherapist, and one chartered accountant. Your other guests will be grateful for the free advice they can extract from them after their fourth drink. But keep track of who is who: you don’t want the lawyer drafting an affidavit on your haemorrhoids or the physio advising you on how to contort or incurvate your income tax return (although both would happily do it if the fee is right).

§ Keep handy a list of the regular panelists on prime time TV and never invite more than one of them at the same dinner or you will end up with an impromptu panel discussion. For example, if you are calling Col. Ajai Shukla then Maroof Raza is a no-no; if Shazia Ilmi then renounce Shobhaa De, if Pavan Verma then do without Ambassador Singh. And if you are out of your mind and want to invite Arnab Goswami then invite no one else – he is his own audience.

§ Never invite an IAS officer and an Army officer to the same dinner or very soon your living room will become a battleground, held hostage to OROP and Non-functional Upgradation . The other guests may soon become “disguested”: they have no interest in one rank one pension. Their interest lies more in the area of “one voter many votes” or ” one Indian bank account, many foreign bank accounts”. As for Non-functional Upgradation, chances are that they’ll consider it a procedure prescribed by a sexologist for improving the…uh…. functioning.

§ It is adviseable not to invite Robert Vadra either, not just because he absolutely refuses to wear a collared shirt, but because he may like your property and want to buy it, after first taking an interest-free loan from you, of course.

A good cologne or after shave lotion is an essential accessory for such occasions. You see, everyone kisses everyone at these dinners: no one shakes hands anymore because the CBI might misconstrue it as an imprimatur on a devious deal, Mafia style. Earlier one kissed only the ladies but now you have to kiss all and sundry (including that hulking golden retriever) or you would be considered anti-LGBT, a politically incorrect position for someone who is supposed to be a mover and shaker of society. Now, I don’t at all mind kissing the ladies: at my stage in life every kiss by a lady is an epiphany. But I have to draw the line at a 250 pounder loin of Punjab with his mane in the wrong place. So I have (without any help from Niti Ayog or the Observer Research Foundation), found a way out of all this convivial slobbering: I apply a little Vicks Vaporub on my nose and announce I have a cold. This keeps everyone away like I was a suicide bomber. Only the golden retriever knows the truth but he ain’t telling anyone.

And finally, the Exit. Exiting a South Delhi dinner is an art which needs a lot of practice and panache. If you leave too soon the hostess would be offended (you didn’t like the food), but if you don’t leave anon she might become apprehensive (you’re staying for breakfast). You have to strike a balance, as the Duchess told the Duke when he kept falling off the bed during their late night amours. You should definitely try to leave before the rooster next door (no, I’m not referring to Arnab Goswami here) greets the dawn. A good exit line is: “Sorry, I must rush–Mr. L.K. Advani is waiting for me.” Since the poor guy has been waiting for two years now for ANYONE to call on him, the statement is not entirely incorrect.

I usually exit just before the fat lady begins to sing.

Avay Shukla

Wednesday, June 13, 2018

Raojibhai Patel III

Raojibhai has touched on the Chinese aggression of 1962. Those days we were very much excited and agitated on account of the perfidy of the Chinese but the Chinese were playing such a diplomatic game with India which was mixed with professions of friendship with calculated future political strategy.The India Govt. was not ready for such lightening military moves across the borders which was silent for centuries . now all of a sudden this century old silence was broken with booming guns and swarms of soldiers .Nehru had hoped that this silence was eternal and India needed no preparations for war. He had studied world history , had learnt historical incidents but had not learnt the practical Machiavelli an diplomacy . This lack of training on the part of Nehru cost the country very dearly by way of cost in humans, military hard ware and prestige .

Those were the days when we held our breath and there was deep anxiety for the shape of the things to come.The Mota does not seem to be touching these sensitivities as that time had already passed. He has philosophized the emotions which is nowhere to be seen in reporting of that time as all where concentrating on physical aspects of the episode. Look how he has theorized these emotions.

1. So far we were impacted by Gandhian non-violence and there was a question put by these Gandhians as to why had we to maintain large armies when we have no enemies and that we were the torch-beares of non-violence and so were immune from violence by any country. They visibly forgot that Pakistan was the first country , within the hours of getting freedom., that had snatched away large tracks of our territory in Kashmir and that territory was yet to be won back and was that task to be performed by resorting to non-violence ?

2. Nehru was always talking of world peace , of Pancha Sheel ( five principles governing the conduct of mutual relations among the member states. ) Nehru was putting himself forward as the only world statesman who was concerned about peace and that the issues between and concerning the member states were to be resolved through peaceful dialogue without resorting to force. HE WANTED TO MAKE HIMSELF IMMORTALISED BY PROTESTATIONS OF PEACE AND CO-EXISTENCE which looking to the currents of world history was quite impossible as we see that in the world peace has hardly prevailed and war , battles on large or small scale is always rule of the day. The territorial disputes with China rose well in 1958 when Nehru paid visits to number of countries , elated throwing flowers and wreaths on the mass of human gatherings and children particularly. .The media gave him wide coverage , his public speeches , press -conferences , his speeches in the parliament ,interventions during the parliamentary discussions , his foreign tours , the visits paid by the foreign dignitaries – keeping Nehru in the centre-stage and more the papers were full of his speeches and at times it appeared that there were not any news except his speeches ! T his caused natural effect that Nehru was a new Avatar for the people of India and the people of India were gripped in this euphoria until one fine morning China smashed this God-like image when India found itself friendless in the world , this is what Raojibhai intends to convey but he has described the anti-climax without describing the ascend to the climax .When some titan falls , it creates ripples , waves and sometimes quakes, Image is like that , apart from the physical destruction or havoc it creates , the damage to the psyche is more lasting and the consequences extend to generations . With the decline and fall of the image of Nehru , India’s prestige as a great nation went down like an avalanche and the nation has till this date not recovered from the shock it received in the defeat of 1962.The division of Pakistan into two different nations in 1971.

3. One thing needs to be reminded what difference is there between Germany post-II world war and India. Germany was humiliated , its borders were ravished, the winners took away saome portions of territory and kept them for exploitation. The people of Germany did not forget this humiliation and with every passing day they were itching for revenge and taking their lost territory back and this is how a disabled Germany rose like a phoenix bird and militarized itself in spite of several odds and not only took the lost territory back but went ahead to capture all Europe except England which was subjected to incessant bombing for months together. The world took a lesson from this and that was that no country should be so humiliated that it would some day prepare to take revenge and upset the balance of power , but there is a condition to this lesson that such people should be self-respecting people and should be itching for revenge.The people of India do not seem to be so itching in spite of the fact that lakhs of miles of its territory is still under the Chinese occupation and yet China goes on making fresh demands on India’s other territory . Yet the Indian markets are flooded with Chinese goods, traders are making trips to China to put fresh orders there . This is the difference between the business community of post I ww of Germany and post-China aggression of 1962 and even to-day. The Indian business community clearly lacks in patriotic spirit and thinks only of maximizing its profits at the cost of consumers and the retrenched labour.

4. Chapter 3 : Fight for Democracy :

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Some thoughts included in this chapter are worth noting: 1. The Chinese aggression exposed hollowness of our thinking in respect of Gandhian ideals and system of our defence. The mixture of Gandhian ethics and Marxist sociology had placed heavy burden on our mode of thought. 2. The Gandhian ideal had neither moved the heart of the English nor that of the Chinese.3.Anti-Imperialism is not our problem ( Nehru had created this problem for us by alienating all the super-powers and China took advantage of this isolation ) and pacifism of the Gandhian type is not our ideal. We should look after our interests and carry out foreign policy to achieve those interests.

Chapter 4 : Nation, Revolution and Renaissance

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In this chapter the Mota has described the tussle between the two intellectual giants of India 1. Gandhi and 2. M N Roy . Gandhi was an astute observer of the thinking of common masses and had used the Indian traditions as a net to snare the masses while M N Roy was a revolutionary and wanted to upset the entire social structure of Indian society in order to put it on the path of progress. Gandhi was an enemy of industries and technology and he had no idea as to how to alleviate the poverty of the people so , he advised the people to keep their needs to the minimum and seek solace and satisfaction in their poverty. More , he propagated from house-top that he was a sanatani ( orthodox ) Hindu and that he believed in chaturvarna . This meant that those who were at particular station in the hierchical social structure had to remain there for ever and had no chance to rise in status . Importantly look to other sapects of his theory , the Muslima a Christians and Parsis w did not form part of the Hindu social structure and so this bondage was not appliocable to them . As a result the percentage of literacy in the Hindus was lower than the Christians , Muslims and the Parsis. The literacy classification as mentioned by sociologist M N Srinivas in his famous book India : Social Structure page No. 23. As under :

Census Muslims Hindus Shikhs Christians Jains Parsis

1891 4.2 % 6.3 % 6.8 % 26.5% 32.6 % 66.2 %

1901 4.4 % 6.5 % 7.5 % 26.6% 30.9 % 76.2 %

1911 5.2 % 7.3 % 8.8 % 28.5 % 34.8 % 82.7 %

1921 6.2 % 8.6 % 8.0 % 31.7 % 37.8 % 83.7 %

1931 7.2 % 9.3 % 10.2 % 30.5 % 38.2 % 83.0 %

The Parsis , Jains and Christians remained in the forefront as far literacy was concerned and as a result standard of their livelihood was better , their living conditions , consumption of food , clothings etc were better and their status in general public was enviable in comparison to 80 % of the Hindus . These figures of Hindu literacy were from the dominant castes , Brahmins, Kshatriyas and Vaishyas as the rest of Hindu society were prohibited from acquiring education under the dictates of Hindu epics ! These dictates were not applicable to Muslims, Christians , Jains and Parsis.
Under the Gandhi scheme the backward castes were to stay where they were .It was this illiterate mass that flocked on streets ,Rly Stations and prarthana sabhas to have a glimpse of Gandhi and hear him . This contributed to a very large scale forming his image as undisputed leader of the Indian mass.Most were uneducated , see the figures between 1901 and 1931 , there is hardly increase of 1.8 % of increase in literacy of the Hindus but the figures for the parallel period for Muslims are 2.8 % for Sikhs 2.7 % for Christians 3.9 % , Jains 7.3 % and Parsis who were already on top in respect of literacy further consolidated their position by 6.8 % ( from 66.2 in 1891 , and 76.2 to 83 % in 1931.Gandhi’s contribution to spread of education among the Hindus was nil and I have referred so many works of Gandhi and have yet to see he prompting the poor , backward castes of the Hindus to send their children to school , while the ground facts were such that even if the parents attempted to send their children to school, the dominant castes resisted this misdemeanour and challenge to the dictates of the sastras. There were cases of assaults on colonies of the backward people when a student was admitted to a school . In a recent case written by one Retd. Collector Vasant D Parmar , IAS , as mentioned by him in an article in a dalit magazine “ Samaj Saurabh “ published from Rajkot , he has narrated his plight as a pupil . Now read his story in his own words . This is the story of Feb 1943 when Gandhism was on top of the Indian fermament. “ My father was illiterate but he thought that the children of the new generation should be imparted education , so he put me and my two cousins in the school of our village Kothamba ( Panchmahal dist , Lunawada desi Rajwada ) on 6.2.1943. We were the only 3 harijan pupils and were prohibited from stepping on the varanda of the school and as such we had to carry a gunny bag from our house and spread it under a neem tree and learn the lessons from whatever fell on our ears and yet all three of us stood 1^st, 2^nd and 3^rd when Dy. Inspector from Lunawad would come and examine us , that too from a distance. If by any mischance and bad luck , we happened touch a savarns ( high caste ) student, we were profusely abused and beaten. After such touch , we were expected to touch a Muslim student who was quite well nourished and fat , and were obliged to touch that muslim student so that the pollution attracted by the high caste pupils could be washed away and they would be purified ! Now it so happened that even that muslim student used to beat us up on account of touching him , that way we were subjected to beating from two ends. We were fed up with this indiscriminate and inhuman treatment and so my two cousins dropped out from the school and I also dropped out on account of the fear of being frequently beaten up and I joined as a farm labourer from the year 1947. “ Gentlemen, this was the year India gained freedom but the backwards could not gain education. The Muslims, Christians and Parsis could because they were not Hindus . This was the punishment for being Hindu in an orthodox society. I had an experience different from V D Parmar , I was beaten up by my teachers for abstaining from the school . The teachers were sincere to teach us , as the school where I was put by my illiterate parents was a Missionary School and the teachers were convert Christians who in their lives were stung by this orthodox Hindu society. I salute those Christian teachers who beat me up for my abstaining in the class so I could reach M A and could appear for IAS direct exam and could one day , this day , take Gandhi to task who betrayed the cause of the dalits while coercing Ambedkar to sign an agreement at Poona in the year 1930 which he had no intention to enforce and his co-religionists totally forgot about the existence of that agreement . Education was the sphere where Gandhi’s social programme should have begun but that was not on his agenda as he was very much eager to capture reigns of power without reforming the backward Hindu upper castes. . He commenced agitation for entry for Harijans in the temples but did not do anything for imparting education to them . God was more important than education, the Gods who did not do anything for them for generations. Now the concept of Humanism comes up, how M N Roy viewed this deceipt of empowering the dominant castes at the cost of deprived sections of society . Here M N Roy’s contribution to the Indian polity shines with full glamour.

Gandhi did not study the changes that took place in the wake of the Industrial Revolution in Europe , the effects it left on the daily life of the masses ,creation of middle-class and class-conflicts their change in culture , behaviour , social status etc. While M N Roy had deeply studied these aspects as he had travelled far and wide , had found friendship with top elite of the Russian Revolution including Lenin, Stalin , Trotsky Bukharin etc and had framed definite road map for the uplift of the trodden masses. Gandhi erred here and had no specific strategy for increasing wages , imparting Roti _ Kapda _ Makan , abolishing discriminations among the people. As regards M N Roy’s blueprints for the future shape of India let us note the following places where he stayed , studied their social, economic problems and their solutions . Let us study his movements across the globe : :

M N Roy left India in summer of 1915 and travelled in In donesia, China , Japan , Philipines , then passed one year in USA , passed two and half years in Mexico, he remained in Russia from 1919 to 1928 , was very active in Communist International movement . He was elected to the highest policy making body , the Presidium of communist International Movement .He was entrusted with organizing and training communist agitators in Asian countries and was imparting training to such workers in the Moscow University . On account of some differences with the leaders of Russia he resigned from the Communist Party and came over to India was arrested in Kanpur Conspiracy case and was jailed for 6 years. He was a freedom-fighter in true sense of the term . He joined the Congress and was made member of AICC. Since Congress supported war efforts of the British Government he resigned from the Congress . He established Radical Democratic Party in 1940 and propagated the cause of radical humanism. We see this name frequently in the writings of Raojibhai Patel and so see how Raojibhai also came under the spell of M N Roy.He founded Indian Renaissance Institute at Dehradun .

He wrote many books including 1. India in Transition ( 1922 ) 2. Revolution and Counter Revolution in China ( 1930 ) 3. Reason, Romanticism and Revolution ( 1930 ) 4.The Future of Indian Politics 5.New Humanism 6.The Russian Revolution 7. Fragments of a Prisoner’s Diary 8. From Communist Menifesto to Radical Humanism. Sri Arunkant Divetiya has translated 12 chapters ( lectures )from the book “ Reason …. “ listed 3^rd above and the Gujarati book is titled “ Saamyavadthi Nav- manav vad published by Indian Radical Humanist Association at Aatman, 4, Sanmitra Society, Near Malav Talav , Jivaraj Park , Ahmedabad 380 051 .

Compare above list with some of Gandhi’s works .They are and 1. Mari Aatmakatha ( My Autobiography ) and another 2. is translation of Bhagvat Geeta in Gujarati There would be score of books on Gandhi by variety of authors including English, but countable by Gandhi himself. One thing has perplexed intelligent observer of Gandhi , that what was really notable in the character of Gandhi , his contribution to nation-building , his reformation of the mentality of general people, his inability in making the dominant castes to forgo their age-old privileges in favour of the deprived , the land-reforms which were necessity of the moment , in respect of increasing incomes of the poor as without increase in incomes the poor could not enjoy higher standards of living and without large-scale industrialization this was not possible at all , he gave Rentiyas , in true sense this instrument was advance technology in comparison to olden times as there is no mention of rentiya in the scriptures ,and yet Gandhi prided in identifying himself as enemy of technology ! He used all new innovations of science like fountain-pen , spectacles, motor-cars ,trains to travel ,loudspeakers to address the rallies ,posts for communications and even telephones and telegrams which were not there in olden Indian situations .He did not mind if the well-to-do and the upper- castes used mthese modern facilities but when the time for common people came he stated burning cloths produced by the mills and made bonfires of the foreign made commodities to the inmates of the Ashrams who were supposed to carry these Rentiya which could not generate bare subsistence –wages , to the poor for augmenting their incomes ! He boycotted cloths produced by mechanized mills which resulted in unemployment of mill-workers , where there was need of increasing employment opportunities he reduced the already existing employments , there was need for preparing coming up and existing generations for shouldering responsibilities in future as ultimately it would be the educated citizens who would carry out Govt’s social policies he gave a call for boycott of schools and colleges , his call was responded to by by students of North India and thousands of students left their education .This thoughtless call was not acceded to in South India as a result the South-Indians continued with their studies and surpassed the Noth-Indians in respect of educated professions . This created such an imbalance between the two parts of the country that the IAS ,IPS ,IFS Central Services came to be monopolized by the South Indians which is not corrected even today also . The damage done by this call of leaving schools and colleges was known during formation of Central Government when enough number of qualified Congreeman were not available to man important ministries and Nehru was obliged to induct non-Congressman as ministers at the Centre. Those who left their schools were stranded and their families uprooted , the gainers were the South Indian Educate d Class who were 99 @ orthodox Brahmins and who carried out the agendas of their caste all over India .In the Centre and the provinces they behaved as braking obstacles in carrying out even willy-nilly social reform measurements and in some cases the draft Acts collected dust for want of framing rules under such Acts and approval of the Central authority. I have a very bad experience of such castist-zealots who happened to post themselves in Ministries like Home , Industries , Communications , Revenue , Finance. Gandfhi did not understand the magic of industrialization a and always resisted it and was hell-bent on preserving old social structure of hiduism without giving thought to the fact that now Non-Hindus like Muslims , Christians , Parsis also lived in the sub-continent and for them this Hindu way of social structure was meaningless .His speeches are compiled and detailed chronicle is published by his private Secretatary Pyarelal but therein we do not find any deep thinking on human problems and systematic presentation with bibliography of books read by him and method of arriving at certain conclusions are always missing in these materials.

( Continued )

Raojibhai Mota Article ii

See how he put up world political and social situation alongwith the Indian perspective. Let us read him for the benefit of those who will not have a chance of reading this volume :

“ To begin with we have to examine the world situation following the first World War , It was this situation together with the depression of the thirties that cause of unrest among the peasantry not only in India but in the world at large. The unrest of the Indian peasantry provided an immediate scope to the rising Gandhian leadership for phasing out the political activity of the Congress .Before Gandhi it was confined to the upper strata of educated professionals like lawyers, and doctors and the urban elite withy Gandhian leadership the Congress was emerging as a movement with its roots in the masses whose political consciousness began to raise (rise) .Though at this stage the spirit of the struggles was rising, the party organization hardly existed and agitation in a large measure was determined by the whims of local leaders. Worried over the proper organization, the Mahatma was forced to discontinue agitations. “ ….. “ In contrast to the Leninist cadre parties , INC ( Now henceforth read Congress in place of INC means Indian National Congress as Mota refers to the Congress as INC) was a mass party. It differed from the Asian Marxist parties in its acceptance of the principle of class-collaboration as a foundation of anti-imperialist politics. From operational point of view Gandhian class collaboration is a corollary to the principle of non-violence .This principle of non-violence imparted to INC its basic feature which made it an instrument for transfer of power rather for capture of power.”

I. Now Mota goes to the art of mobilization of masses by Gandhi, read him in his own words “The postulated universality was expected to integrate traditional groups. Mahatma’s prayer meetings, rather than education through the basis units of the INC , provided the basis for action . Through the medium of his Prayer Meetings , he cultivated direct contact with the masses. And how mammoth were these meetings sometimes is a matter of gesture. Look, one point is there , during those days there was not any means of entertainment so , general public attended these meetings in large numbers. I myself remember the days when Vinoba Bhave , the spiritual heir to Gandhi visited Surat probably in 1950s , entire SURAT COME ON ROAD TO HAVE HIS DARSHAN , BOTH SIDESD OF LONG ROADS WERE PACKED WITH PEOPLE, AND ON SEEING HIM PEOPLE STARTED SHOUTING Vinoba Zindabad. As a boy of 12 or 13 , I was among the public. Then Nehru visited Surat on his way to enquire about health of one of the companions of Gandhi in South Africa , he was a Muslim. Nehru went to that village Kachholi appx 15 km away from Surat. It was the same story , People packed on both sides of the roads wherever he went , even on roads passing through villages , people jampacked the roads. People had come to attend his public meeting , and they had come on foot for miles and miles . There was ,a sort of craze at that time to have a darshan of the national leaders. The attendance at the Prayer meetings of Gandhi , was in thousands , and at Rly stations too thousands would collect to see him . Naturally , he wielded great influence with the masses and it is the experience of the world ,that those leaders who bring such large number of people under their spell , start wielding authority, This is the way he built up his spring board across the country creating an awe among the Congress leaders that now they had nothing to do but to see that this magic of Gandhi works , at least up to the freedom is gained , as it was their ultimate aim , They dreamt of freedom and were not much sincere in putting Gandhi’s precepts in practice which were outmoded and did not suit the changing situations of the country’s industrialization ,and westernization of culture and thinking. Mahatma built up direct contact with the masses with the result that the party machinery became secondary factor in devising mass action ( this happened in number of countries where the leader with mass appeal cultivates direct contact with masses and the party organs start depending on him for political ends. In other words party does not count , only leader matters and the party remains at the mercy of that leader. Another result of this strategy is that no second cadre comes up , and the party looks on for the appointment of his heir and a dynastic rule follows . In case of Gandhi he was made to appoint Nehru as his political heir on account of his compromise with Motilal Nehru , father of Jawaharlal Nehru ,and Vinoba Bhave as spiritual heir( ! ) both Brahmins. By doing so , he acknowledged the supremacy of the Brahmins over not only the Hindus but also the non-Hindu population of undivided India. The muslims resented this and that is how the cry for a separate State for the Muslims gained added momentum.-BRP)The party organs did not develop a consciousness of responsibility for action. This being so, the INC could never confront the Mahatma with the problem of social goals to be achieved by the post-independence state. Nehru once wrote a letter to the Mahatma in this connection but on receiving the stern response from him he did not press the point any further. The Mahatma rather than

the party was deemed accountable to the people. It was the Mahatma who stumbled upon a Himalayan blunder and not the party. The Congress as a party lived a life devoid of morphology. It was amorphous and this amorphousness was honoured as a principle of liberalism. “

No one even Gandhi hided the fact that he was an apostle for orthodoxy , he gave his identity ( lakh in Gujarati ) as staunch sanatani hindu , flaunted a big ( kanku ) vermilion on his forehead , started his agitations on auspicious tithis as per hindu calendar , did not appoint even a single Muslim as Manager of any ashram anywhere in India ,,Gandhi observed Varnavyavastha in its crude form and only to balance this a smoke screen of the emancipation of the Harijans was raised which led the gullible among the most backward classes that he was really a great saint. Gandhi raised so much dust in the name of untouchability that the Hindus were led to believe that untouchability was only for the Harijans ,while in reality untoucahability as inherited from the Hindu conventions was observed towards the Shudras who are now Backward Classes and whose nomenclature was changed to Mandal Communities in the wake of the pronouncement of the report of the Mandal Commission and in Gujarat who are identified as Baxi Panch castes. By doing so Gandhi comfortably removed this stigma of untouchability from the forehead of the Shudras and foisted it on the harijans. Now that the Shudras were purified by Gandhi , they easily started to wear the mantle of pure Hindus and started to observe untouchability towards the Harijans and started giving the same treatment to the Harijans which was given to the forefathers of the Shudras by the Caste –Hindus..This is a travesty of social history when a greatman like Gandhi replaced one set of people to bear the brunt of popular disgust and contempt without any social, religious or cultural justification. This inhuman practice was simply an extension of the stratification and gradation of castes 1. Brahmins looking down upon the Kshatriyas, Vaishyas and the Shudras 2. Kshatriyas looking down upon the Vaishyas ,and Shudras , Vaishyas looking down upon the Shudras Now what the Shudras could do to transfer this burden downwards ? So they found some castes and sub-castes from their own fold to look down upon as this system was based on treating some ones inferior so their own status could rise. In one sentence the Caste-System made the men not lengthening their own line in order to rise in social stratification , but shortening the line of others ! This was the way all Hindus were engaged in this art of shortening lines of others and thereby. Shortened the cumulative line of the Hindus and that is how the foreign invaders found this land attractive for invasions and defeating the kings one by one and thereby facilitating the occupation.

Politics during 1920 to 1935

------------------ -------------- This period in the life-span of the Congress is very important as it was during this time that 1. The Congress oscillated between modernism and traditionalism 2.What social policies the independent State could pursue once freedom was achieved as there was tension over this between Gandhi and the Congress. 3. The party could do nothing to influence the course of action as it was not the source of mass action , Gandhi had captured the imagination and loyalty of the masses by his direct contact with them. It was Gandhi from whom the stamina and inspiration for mass action emanated not the Congress. Congress was reduced to playing second fiddle to the tune of Gandhi. This helplessness on the part of Congress determined the course of action for the coming decades and the formation , of the Constituent Assembly that approved the new Constitution . .

Article iii ( Congress loses ground during 1935 to 1960s )

Mota has vividly described the vanishing influence of the British raj or rather loosening of its grip over internal politics of India. He says on page No 164 “ The British Imperial economy was collapsing and the political structure of the empire had to adapt itself to these changing economic conditions. It ( British economy ) could survive only by sharing political power with the rising bourgeois leadership in colonies….The Mahatma and the INC were willing to co-operate in order to demonstrate to the people of India that the principle of nonviolent action yields fruits. The protest of the tiny left- wing was brushed aside and the INC came into power in many states. Thus the Britishers secured their their position in Delhi by immunizing the imperial govt against mass agitations.”

According to this logic the winner of 1942 Quit India movement was the British Govt and not the Congress party as in order to survive in power and continue tasting sweet loaves of Govt authority the Congress leaders who scrambled for getting into the Govt machinery sacrificed their ideology of standing by the people , the poor , the exploited classes and started carrying out actions which in normal course would have been taken by the British Govt, ! It was at this point that the communist movement gathered momentum and the communist started flexing their muscles all over India. M N Roy left Congress , thousands of hardcore communists were imprisoned and if my memory is correct the leaders like S A Dange and others gave a call to the imprisoned communist workers to start an uprising against the Govt in the jails , as a result of which thousands of hardcore communist workers were got killed by their own leaders who actually were carrying out the agenda of the zamindars and capitalist class. There after there is a visible decline in the communist movement , Dange etc were rewarded for their services later on but the communist bosses never made sincere efforts to revive the communist spirit , I remember that spirit when as a boy of 15 or 16 I could collect a group of 8-10 boys and starta running procession shouting “ Lal Vavto Zindabad and pass from the door-step of a Congress leader who was so much annoyed with me that he had rebuked me in strong terms stating that I did not know that the Principal of the Mission High School were I was studying was a staunch Congressman ! Such was the spirit of the pre-Independence days ! . Now look to the tragedy , those killed belonged to non-upper castes of the Hindu social structure, This is how the non-Upper Caste leadership of the Communist movement was eliminated in the jails after India gained freedom. Now the leadership of communist movement fell into the hands of the Brahmins and it continues even to this day. The ugly face of social stratification concealed itself behind a smoke screen of forgetfulness and now no historian worth the name remembers this ugly episode of Indian history!

I am surprised why Mota has avoided this important episode in his writings . Mota . He traces how Congress gradually deviated from its lofty ideals and as a result how number of political groupings sprang up all over India and this trend posed great challenge to the stability of Congress organisation. Kisan Sabhas and Trade Unions posed great threat to the Congress monopoly of political activity , in fact , there was none as meanwhile Congress was reduced to Election Party and it left a big void for political initiatives and the opportunity was easily grabbed by leaders who were disenchanted from the performance of Congress , they started their own outfits as they had duly learnt the art of of mobilizing the masses while they were in Congress . This drift of number of committed workers cost Congress heavily in future but the national Congress leaders were overconfident of their hold over the people which in reality was not there. Congress survived on the wages of its labour of freedom struggle so far the old generation who had seen the personal magic of Gandhi , his espousal of national spirits , his swadeshi movement etc carried this historical burden over their head but with the disappearance of this old generation that magic also faded and gradually disappeared and new voters who had not come under the spell ( prabhav ) of that age and gave precedence to their daily problems of livelihood over that memory of past and became more amenable to the parochial appeals couched with orthodoxy . threw away this burden to the winds in North India that is how a great threat emerged to the Congress from U.P. under one time Congressman Charan Singh who brought the jats of UP, Rajasthan , Punjab and Haryana under his spell .

Congress was not brought up to fight for poor people’s rights as its leaders were always drawn from the classes and this was the cause of and for the masses .If one considers the composition of the Congress of that time one would come across a sorry fact that practically all the Presidents of the Provincial Congress Committees were either big Jamindars, Upper caste activists like Brahmins and vaishyas and in rare cases former rulers of the Rajwadas ( princely states) who were from the kshatriya caste. In Bihar Congress always preferred big Brahmin Zamindars as PCC chiefs as well Chief Ministers for decades and as a result there has been an accumulation of agrarian problems in this part of the country and its tragic results are now visible in Zarkhand, Uttaranchal and truncated Bihar also in the form of Naxalwadi extremism. In North India there worked a mixture of both Zamindari colonialism,and concealed Hindu religiosity .There was a big talk of secularism in the Constitution and in the public speeches but the Central and Sate ministers openly flaunted their religious loyalty by performing Hindu poojas when they inaugurated public utilities like laying Foundation stone , Bhumi Pujan , Innauguaration ceremonies etc. Even the buildings of judiciary were not spared from this religious ceremonies and the Chief Justices and SC judges flaunted tilak on their foreheads performing poojas which was not called for if one believed in true undiluted secular ideals.Moreover professing a particular religion was private matter of the individual and the public servants were not supposed to exhibit their religious loyalty while executing their official duties . This practice continues this date giving an impression to the orthodox elements in the majority community that all these VIPs are their brothers in arms , this is a very sorry observation to make but one has to take a stand when the nation drifts from its chosen and cherished constitutional ideals and aims and public welfare.

How this happened ?

Mota traces this process from 1946 to 1964 when Nehru dominated the political scene in India and 9 Pages 167, 168, 169, 170, 171 , 172 are packed with Mota’s political wisdom and historical significance.

What were the factors that shaped the heart and mind of the following decades , that shaped, nourished and brought up a political entity which was never intended by those who fought the struggle for freedom and the passive population of India who supported Gandhi’s struggles from a distance and hoped for better tomorrows when the foreign ral was gone and Indians shaped their own destiny.

Mota traces this process right to 1935 Act . When freedom was granted ( rather not won ) , the political class busied itself with drafting a Constitution. The question arose as to whom the power was to be transferred ? The Britishers were brought up in the tradition of political thinkers and thought it proper that the power should be handed over to the representatives of the people. Now the modalities for choosing the representatives were thought over..There was no time , and political will to give this matter a mature consideration. And between 1935 to 1946 there did not occur any contingency to change the system of picking up ( not electing in true sense of the term ) representatives. So far the electors were moneyed class , dominant classes and dominant castes who elected representatives to the Assemblies. They were property holders means “haves “ and not “ have-nots “In Gujarati vocabulary they were sanchits and not vanchits. The people from the princely States were not allowed to participate in this process of electing representatives and they constituted one third of the population. Those who were recognized as the representative s of the people of India were only a tiny group of vested interests . They prepared the foundation of the New India , read the various provisions of the Constitution. : Preamble : WE, THE PEOPLE OF INDIA , having solemnly resolved to constitute India into a SOVEREIGN , SOCIALIST,SECULAR ,DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC and to secure to all its citizens : JUSTICE , social, economic and political, LIBERTY of thought , expression, belief, faith and worship ; EQUALITY of status and opportunity ; and to promote among them all FRATERNITY assuring the dignity of the individual and the unity and the integrity of the nation ;

Now more on various rights accruing to the citizenry from the Constitution . These are called Fundamental Rights and they are included in part three in the Articles No 12 to 35. Let us enumerate the same, 1. Right to Equality before Law on the grounds of religion, race, caste, sex, or place of birth; employment , abolition of untouchability and titles. 2.Right to Freedom- speech and expression,; assemble peacefully , and without arms , to form associations or unions;3. Right against Exploitation- Prohibition of traffic in human beings and forced labour, prohibition of employment of children in factories etc. 4. Right to Freedom of Religion- conscience and free profession practice and propagation of religion ; manage religious affairs payment of taxes for promotion of any particular religion ; attendance at any religious instructions or religious worship in certain educational institutions . 5. Cultural and Educational Rights – protection of interests of minorities ti establish and administer educational institutions 6. Right to Constitutional Remedies – all citizens are guaranteed the right to move the Supreme Court or High Courts by appropriate proceedings for the enforcement of Fundamental Rights. ( Note: Amendments No 16^th and 24^th have considerably limited the exercise of Fundamental Rights . Let us now scan through these( a ). Amendment No 16 was passed in 1963 empowering the State to enact any legislation , imposing reasonable restrictions in the exercise of Fundamental Rights by citizens , so as to protect the sovereignty and integrity of India. ( b ) Amendment No 24 was passed in 1971 affirming the Parliament’s power to amend any part of the Constitution , including the Fundamental Rights by amending Articles 138 and 13 of the Constitution The President was made bound to give assent to amending Acts when they were presented to him. This made Presidential Assent an automatic act . Part IV , The Directive Principles of the State Policy The relavent Articles are 36 to 51, they lay down 19 principles , enjoing the State to undertake within its means , a number of welfare measures. These are intended 1 to . assure citizens an adequate means of livelihood, 2. Raise the standard of living, 3. improve public health ,4. Provide freeand compulsory education to children . and 5. ensure that the economic system does not result in the concentration of wealth and means of production to the detriment of the common good. These principles are not enforceable at law like Fundamental Rights . Neverthless, they are declared fundamental to the governance of the country.

This way those who were nowhere near the poor and the poorest wanted to create a nation which was socialist, democratic , classless and casteless . There was definitely a flood of hypocrisy in the mind of those who approved this Constitution as it was like foregoing their age old privileges , social economic and political domination , discriminations against lower castes AND THE SUPERIORITY OVER THE CASTES STRATIFIED BELOW THEIR RESPECTICE CASTES UNDER THE Brahmanical order of Hindu society. They did it, common people believed the propaganda in support of “ socialist society “ , they also believed in “ Garibi Hatao “ slogan of Indira Gandhi and swelled the ballot-boxes with the votes , they believed that India was embarking on a course of “ secularism “

Now let us agree with Raojibhai when he says on page No 167 :

“ To constitute the authority to receive power , elections were held in India in

India in 1946 on the basis of 1935 Act which restricted franchise ( voting

eligibility ) only to the tax-paying section of the population of Br itish India. The

people of the princely states were excluded from participation in the election.

Thus power was transferred to the tiny group of property holders. More

Surprising is the fact that the mode of transfer of power ultimately created a

Theocratic Pakistan ‘“ In Pakistan the wealthy , the educated and zamindars were

always siding with religious fanaticism and Jinna was on their hit-list right since

1943. While he was in Bombay in his house situated on Mount Pleasant on

23^rd July 1943, one militant youth from Lahore named Rafiq Sabir Majangavi

trespassed into his bunglow and attacked Jinna with a knife , the assailant was

overpowered , prosecuted and jailed for 5 years. His connections were never

divulged as he never opened his mouth about the persons behind the plot.

. ( from “ Mohammad ali Jinna “ by Raju Raj pp No 126 Tulsi Sahitya Publication New Delhi

Similarly Gandhi was also subjected to attacks but lately, but before that Jinna

had come under the scanner of the Islamic militancy. Lahore is to this date a hot

bed of Islamic militancy.

Raojibhai hits bull’s eye ( in the terminology of fire arms ), when he says that after the attainment of freedom “ the politics of democratic causes was replaced by the politics of hunting offices. The governmental wing of the party choked the voice of the so-called organizational wing .The only function reserved for the latter was to help the3 former ( government wing ) to win the elections The modern ideology which Nehru professed was rendered useless in winning elections because the voting behavior of the Indian people was non-progressive.

I disagree with the Mota on this score , the aims of the political class that fought against the Britishers was to grab power , the freedom struggle was never motivated for the amelioration of the poor and the down-trodden, in Gandhi the dominant castes particularly the Brahmins saw a golden opportunity to capture the throne to be vacated by the British and bring not only the Hindus but even non-Hindus under their authority , When Nehru talked of “socialist society the deprived and backwards were made to believe that a paradise which descended over Russia was now about to transform their lives as was done in Russia , then “ then the Congress under the pressure of the dominant casted , changed the gear and started talking of “ socialist pattern of society “ even then the zamindars and capitalists and dominant castes were afraid of repeating Russia in India and so the Congress including Nehru started changing the gear again and now it was “ socialistic pattern of society “ which the governing class has thrown to the wind and by propaganda , atrotious inflation and creating fresh issues and high-lighting minor and inconsequent issues into national issues have artificially forced the masses to forget this socialism and even a slight reference to it is looked on by the Congress and other national leaders with contempt. This process was undertaken on a massive scale during the rule of Indira Gandhi who instead of bringing socialism talked of “ Garibi Hatao “ now the shift is to “ Ram Rajya “ “ Ram Temple ‘ and when Atal Bihari Bajpai was leader of the Opposition in Lok Sabha he has gone on record on the premises of Rashtrapati Bhavan on public address system stating that ‘ let Ram Temple come up in Ayodhya , all the problems of India will be solved” ! So the people believed him that the problems of India were connected with building or not building Ram Temple in Ayodhya and the electorate gave majority to him. Then , after becoming Prime Minister he and the BJP realised that building a Temple In Ayodhya would solve problems of employment for a few masons , labourers and contractors only , and for solving the gigantic problems like eradication of poverty , unemployment , illiteracy , housing , health , restoring public confidence in Govt. machinery to maintain law and order and meeting threat6s of the terrorists , keeping communal peace and harmony needed human efforts and no God could help solve these problems so in spite of remaining in power for 5 years , Bajpai or BJP did not build the Temple . Temple was a weapon to demolish Congress only . People are not made great by buiding or demolishing structures but by creating jobs for the unemployed , increasing their health , building houses for the deprived in other words by addressing the daily issues of ROTI, KAPDA AND MAKAN and AROGYA ..This is the game political class goes on playing of shifting the attention of general public , particularly the poor and the gullible from basic issues and does not allow them to concentrate on the real issues confronting them like the poverty , lack of housing , sanitation , employment , poor health , social disabilities , education etc. Now consider the recent Act passed by the Central Govt. on right to education , it was included in the Constitution in 1950 and it took 60 years for the Govt. to pass this legislation , even the rules to be framed under some social legislations like Eradication of Untouchability takes years to frame , and legislative endorsements by the Assemblies take months and years because the dominant classes who command the bureaucracy and parties are not psychologically committed to the causes of social amelioration of the most backwards SCs and STs. The implementation of Mandal Commission Report took years across the country and in between the dominant castes had unleashed violent agitations and in Gujarat the govt .led by Madhavsinh Solanki was forced to resign as it favoured the Shudras. These shudras then rallied behind Adwani ( BJP and during 1990s ) for rehabilitation of the Hindu God Ram , forgetting that no God worth the name had ever bothered to protect their ancestors from the innumerable humiliations and disabilities since centuries and Ram was alleged to have kiled a Shudra named Shambuk

who in the defiance of religious commands had committed a grave crime of worshipping a Hindu God , his crime being that he was born in a shudra fold and so he was not entitled to worship a Hindu God.. Then with changing political scene the shudra was brought to life again , but a fact remained that he was killed by no other than Ram for worshipping a Hindu God , the incident still reverberates in the mind of the orthodox Hindus who are in most of the cases descendants of SHAMBUK WHO WAS KILLED BY Ram for the crime of worshipping him , deny entry to the harijans into the Hindu temples in the South., construct dividing walls between their and theirs colonies , prohibit passage from their streets and what not , one peculiar thing about these practices is that there are no prohibitions against the Muslims in those areas. This is the punishment for worshipping Hindu Gods in earlier times the penalty was paid by the ancestor Shambuk of the Shudras , now it is paid by the Harijans, the Hindu fold has not been showing any sign of parivartan even centuries after large scale conversion from ancient India which once extended from Afghanistan to presenr day Bangla Desh. It should be said to the credit of the Britishers that they added Ceylone , and Burma to that entity and si8lently ceded them away from mainland politics and the Indian politicians had no grasp over the consequences of that act.

Mota’s assessment of the political scene as narrated on page No 168 is rather not shrewd but simplistic. Gandhi never desired Congress to gain strength vis-à-vis his domination over it. Theirs was a master and slave relationship ! He quit as party member ,and yet controlled it from remote instrument. One should agree with Churchill that the strength of a leader is measured from the party organization he creats as it is the organization on whose shoulders the leader sits and commands , controls the near and distant politics .Here Gandhi did not do that but left the organizational work to Patel, if one sees the reports of that period one would immediately catch a sorry figure of Nehru. Nehru engrossed himself in public speeches and drafting lengthy resolutions of Congress Working Committee, AICC, and plenary sessions of the Adhiveshans he never bothered about day-to-affairs , creating leaders , motivating the lower cadres which are oxygen to the body of the party. He went on creating a colossal image of himself in the mind of the people . While Sardar Patel went on coming into close contact with the party workers , second and front level leaders , measuring them , how much strength they would wield , how reliable they would be in future and in fact he kept tract on the workers and leaders . As a result he became seasoned politician and a great mind-reader. He could exactly say what a particular person would do after particular lapse of time and how he would behave under certain circumstances. Take one example, Shri Sadoba Patil of Maharashtra and Union Railway Minister once came to Bardoli ( Sardar’s laboratory of mass movement ) for delivering a lecture in Sardar Ashram ( probably in 1973 or 74 where I had to look after after his security ) . He said once during turbulent days of reorganization of States one particular man came to Sardar’s residence , Patil was present there. After talking with him he left. Then Sardar said to Patil that this man is a rolling stone and he will go now to Jawahar, Patil then left Sardar’s house and proceeded to Nehru’s place and he found that particular person waiting to see Nehru! I still remember a letter written by Sardar to Nehru advising him to be ware of the Chinese as their intentions were doubtful .He had written a letter to Nehru and that is a document. Nehru disregarded his advice and we see how Chinese overran our defences. Nehru was a student of history, he has written at least two books with a fictional style 1. Glipses of World History and 2. Discovery of India during his jail terms. But the historians do not agree with his drawing lessons from certain world and national events. He regarded Himalayas as insurmountable barrier against any Chinese invasion , while in fact Chinese traveler Hue En Sang had already crossed the High Himalayas centuries ago and in recent years the Tibetan refugees in thousands strength had crossed the Himalaya on foot in 1958. If a lonely man like Hue En Sang could cross Himalaya and lakhs of Tibetan refugees could imitate him after centuries , why Chinese military equipped with superior military hardware can’t do the same after 1958 and after a prolong exchange of letters , memoranda and dialogues . This went on for years and yet Nehru’s Himalaya remained insurmountable to him until a fine early morning Chinese guns shattered peace of the mountains and wrong belief of the Prime Minister of India.

We can agree with Mota what prompted Gandhi to designate Nehru as his political heir when he had not acquired necessary shrewdness, mind-reading and skills for handling persons particularly higher ups.One should go back to history of 1920s when father of Ja3wahar Nehru, Motilal was a leading light of the Swaraj Party and Gandhi wanted his co-operation and enjoined him to join Congress. It is so said that Motilal had seen the colour of the days to come after advent of Freedom and so he demanded oif Gandhi to give preferential treatment to Jawahar and appoint him as his heir. Once this appointment came through , Jawaharlal Nehru was certainly a heir-apparent to the throne. Now look to the personal politics of Gandhi. He was a vaishya and professed from house-top that he was a Sanatani Hindu. He believed in maintenance of Chaturvarna in which the Brahmins were at the top of the Hindu social order.There were at least three contestants for the post of the heir to Gandhi 1. Jay Prakash narayan 2. Vallabh Patel and 3. Nehru. Jayprakash belonged to Kayastha caste which was not a savarna caste ( his ancestors were copiers of the documents , as during those days there were not carbon-papers or fax machines ( Carbon Paper was invented in , Type writer in 1808 , but before that the ancestors of Jay Prakash Narayan were copying the documents manually and so their occupation fell under physical- workers and were considered Shudras for the purposes of Hindu Varna Vyavastha ). 2. As regards Vallabhbhai Patel the social status was quite clear , the Patels were not Brahmins , Rajputs , or Vaishyas and so fell under the category of Shudras. As Shri M N Srinivas the famous Sociologist has said , since the Patels were connected with farming and farming involved killing of insects , they were kept beyond the periphery of the Savarnas , they were not allowed to enter the Hindu Temples and so they formed their own set Swaminarayan panth , built temples but the Brahmins refused to serve as poojaris in those temples and so the Swaminarayan-leaders created theirf own priest-class which is drawn from the Kadva sub-caste of the community. That was the position during the pre-British period and continues even to-day , now the Patels care for the hoods about the Brammins. An interesting thing happened during the regime of the C M Keshu Patel of Gujarat when Keshubhai refused to accept one Brahmin leader Ashok Bhatt as Minister and too much pressure was brought about on the C M, Keshubjai appointed him in the cabinet . at the time of swearing-in ceremony Ashok Bhatt went to the C M Keshubhai Patel and touched his feet as a gesture of gratitude . Here the historical cycle of the domination of the Brahmins took a full circle and I was amused to see this picture as the symbol of changing fortunes of the dominant caste , the Brahmin that one day was . But that gesture was quite short-lived, and Ashok Bhatt secretly manoevred with Narendra Modi , in order to bring about the down-fall of Keshubhai and they succeeded in last leg of 2001. This episode is indicative of the changing fortunes of the castes in Gujarat. But before that Vallabhbhai was made to suffer this humiliation , if you read the history of the imprisonments of Gandhi and Vallabhbhai Patel , particularly the Diaries written by private secretary of Gandhi, Mahadevbhai Desai you would find that both had a very good personal rapport and Nehru was never close enough to Gandhi as Vallabhbhai was , but Gandhi was more loyal to Varna Vyavastha than personal bonds with Patel and so in the process of heir- selection , Patel was bye-passed and Nehru came on the top of the national politics. When this game was on , there was no lobbying for Vallabhbhai patel as there was no lobby for espousing cause of a Shudra for the post of Prime Minister of .India , created smooth ground for Nehru , and Patel was removed like a stone on the road. In Congress circles also there seemed to be no grumbling as Gandhi had magnified and extended his personal politics to national politics , a more deserving candidate was neglected not on merits but on basis of age-old Varna Vyavastha. So it is difficult to agree with Mota when he says on page No 168 Second paragraph that “ Anyway, Sardar Patel lost the game because his weapon INC was not sharp and strong enough for his task. It was weak in comparison to Nehru’s weapon – the Government. I remember an advice given to Prince Jahangir by his father Akbar that “ This is a land where authority rules supreme. Whoever wields authority , will find all on his side ,so never lose the reins of authority. “ Jahangir became Emperor by adhering to this advice and Nehru became Prime Minister on the same criteria ! If one goes to historical background , this battle for supremacy was long decided even before it began in 1946-47 .The answers prepared by Brahmins centuries ago , were not fitting the bills of 1940s and 1950s. Looking to the frequent and mind-boggling travels, discussions, parleys and strategems Patel played with the princes and his advisors, one can certainly say that Nehru as the Organiser would have been aq grand failure and . Even leaders like Suhravardi who were brought up , trained in the dust of practical politrics could check-mate Nehru easily. Nehru was a high flier with no guts for greets of practical politics , Patel was a suitable to the gimmics of the Pakistanis .This is all narrated in V P Menon’s book and is interesting thing to learn not only for future policians but also for future diplomats.

3. Nehru. His ancestors hailed from Kashmir. If one sees through the history of his movements right from childhood , one would realize that he had noy travelled far enough and had not gained any knowledge of various people , castes , regions , religions , differtent problems confronting the widely distyributed land , had not come in contact with different persons ,leaders , understood their problems their limitations , their strengths and their aspirations . As regards organizational ability he drew blank , his only passion was to address public meetings , court arrest, go to prison and write books .He knew that image building was a sure step to the throne and with the media monopolised his caste-fellows this was an easy job.. By now the dominant caste , the Brahmins had understood that Jawahar Nahru was tipped to fill the void of Gandhi , and this time came much earlier, even before freedom came .His succession to Gandhi was a well orchestrated historical exercise and with the help of media , Motilal Nehru’s dream of his son becoming a democratic Caesar over the political firmament in India came true. The third paragraph on page no. 168 describing the fall of Gen Sec Kriplani at the hands of Nehru is eye-opener. The 4^th paragraph heralds the days of authority over organization and it continued for decades .Mota’s memorable sentence be repeated here ‘ He ( Nehru ) reduced the Party to impotence and converted it into an election agent . The party had to suffer because it abjured the principle of mass action which alone can nourish its roots among the masses. “ Mass agitations always put the leaders’ ability to mobilize and also their following among the masses .Agitations are like examinations for the leaders as well as the common workers. Workers get a chance to go near the ordinary people and persuade them to join the processions , rallies or to attend public demonstrations .Agitations are like oil to lubricate the parts of the machinery and provide a chance to the ambitious workers to prove their ability and gain knowledge about the issues involved in the agitation. As a result agitations always throw up new leaders and side-tract the useless leaders. As a result , the vested interests among the leaders who have no roots among the masses never allow any agitations lest new leaders would come up and their position in the party would be threatened. Once a set of leaders was prepared , even Gandhi does not seem to have favoured fresh agitations after 1942 ! Here Mota seems to have forgotten that as the case with Gandhi was , his heir was decided even before the exigency arose , during 1920-30s , and Nehru had already decided to appoint Indira as his successor , so a strong party machinery would have been a liability to the appointer and there was a great likelihood of coming up of an organized opposition to the appointee , so a weak and paralysed party was a must for the dynastic rule , and here history got repeated when Shastri had to serve as care-taker P M and make way for Indira. Both these great men had played mischief with the maqsses’ feelings and regarded them no better than “ huers of wood and drawers of water “.

If you read Patel’s Secreatry V P Menon’s book “ Integration of the Indian States “ ( Orient Longman 1956 ed. ) you would get an idea about his diplomatic skill , maturity of handling the mischievous princes , like Nawab Of Bhopal ,particularly Nizam of Hyderabad and his notorious Prime Minister Kasim Razvi of Razakar Party , Nawab of Junagadh and variety of princes with fanciful ideas about sovereignty , suzerainty etc the ideas their fore fathers had not dreamt of during the reign of the British !

Let us remember some memorable sentences from Mota.

1. The crux of the doctrine of the political pragmatism is the relative irrelavence of the party in building political bridges between the state and the people. The party is reduced to merely an election agent .

2.The party is forced abjure ideology. The activity of election seizes the party mind and , which then disassociates itself from the day-to-day struggles of the masses for survival and freedom. The institution of election is highlighted as the sole determinant of the democratic character of the state and the society. It becomes an exclusive criterion of a democratic character of the government. Other freedoms are valued as merely subservient to the so-called free-elections.

3. Thus with independence, Gandhian ideology lost its significance for social change and the so-called constructive workers were relegated to a secondary position in the Congress Party.

…….During the transition from activity which helped people in their day-to-day struggles for survival and freedom- at least of the downtrodden people, - to the election exclusively the roots of the party ( Congress ) in the struggling masses dried up.

This observation of Mota is very interesting, look , the areas where Congress picked up High-Caste Brahmin Zamindars as the Chief Ministers for too long eg Bihar . The CMs ruled as Zamindars and the entire lot of landless labour turned hostile to the Congress and for decades Congress does not see any chance of come-back. Bengal was handed over to the Brahmin CMs the last being Siddharth Shanker Ray , who massacred the agitators of poor on a large –scale and the only result was that the Marxists came to power and are stayed put in the saddle since decades. In Andhra region Congress gave reign of power to big Zamindars and the natural result was that in backward region of Telangana , communists dug their foothold . Now the cumulative effects of the Congress exercise are that Naxalist activities are running with high speed . It happened so, because the Congress left the space , which was readily occupied by the waiting militant activists.

4. The leadership thrown up by elections looks upon the leaders of the struggling masses as a threat to their power . A tension prevails between the two which cripples the nation state.

Mota’s analysis as to how the urban populace came under the influence of the non-Congress parties is very shrewd. Many a social worker would not probably be knowing the reasons. He says that ( page No 170 bottom para ) The refugees from Pakistan spread over almost India > They were bitterly anti-Muslim and seeing their plight the mind of the urbans were moved by their plight

….. After partition, the Indian Muslims could not touch Muslim League and they drew closer to Congress for obvious reasons. The Congress took a hint from Nehru ( see the article by historian Ramchandra Guha in his article in the Hindu dt. July 20 2008 , Nehru said in Oct 1947 ,“We have a Muslim minority who are so large in numbers that they can not , even if they want , go anywhere else. That is a basic fact about which there can be no argument. Whatever the provocation from Pakistan and whatever the indignities and horrors inflicted on the non-Muslims there, we have got to deal with this minority in a civilized manner. We must give them security and the rights of citizens in a democratic state. “ The Muslims came to attend Congress meetings in a large number , sometimes they happened to host its meetings in their houses , and were selected for party posts too. This alienated some sections of the Hindus and dislike to Congress in cities came to take roots. The Hindu migrants from Pakistan particularly from Sindh settled in Gujarat ,Madhya Pradesh ,Rajasthan ., Delhi .This is how so many cities in North India came under anti-Congressism.

Quite striking observations are found as regards the melt down of Congress secularism. As a result of Shyama Prasad Mukherji’s formatioin of Jan Sangh , Congress’ response was diluting its own secular ideology, though “it lacked a healthy ideology of modernism necessary to fight the forces of traditionalism “ .Congress went further to appease Urban Elite and “ induced Radhakrihnan “ to occupy Rashtrapati Bhavan. Thus were destroyed the conditions for the rise of a modern secular nation state , which were laid during the initial period of pre-independence days. “

What were the benefits of the much orchestrated Integration of the princely Sates on the Congress ? No doubt India as a nation gained , but Congress came to lose in a surprising way. There was no other party of the eminence except Congress , so the Ex- Rulers of the princely States started joining the the in a big way. The new entrants “ started dominating the Congress units on the basis of their hold over their former subjects “ .. “ In almost all cases the Congress units had to accept the tutelage of the deposed princes and looked to them for votes during elections. In many cases the Congress nominated ex-princes for Lok Sabha seats Thus on the basis of their hold on their subjects , they came to dominate both , the Congress party and the Lok Sabha. Feudal elements and the allied rich peasants politically dominated the party. “ One more convincing matter Mota has brought to our attention that the entire energy of Congress was directed against the British and the Maharajas were kept untouched , in other words the Princes were kept “ holy “ like cows and their image remained unscathed . This happened , as I think now , due to the Kings’ position in Hindu social hierarchy , as the Kings since hundreds of years were considered to be under the surveillance and ritual domination of the Brahmins and it was through the state might that the Hindu Varna vyavastha came to be severely imposed by the Brahmins in this Brahmin Order of Hindu society. As such the Hindu Kings enjoyed special treatment at the hands of the Congress leadership which was predominantly Brahmin and one Vaishya who was Gandhi, who prided to be called a sanatani Hindu. The special treatment received by the ex-Hindu rulers was as a reward for keeping the Hindu Varna vyavastha in tact for centuries .The treatment received by the kingdoms of Junagadh and Hyderabad was different and more their advisors ( Prime Ministers , Vazirs etc ) were Muslims and those of the Hindu kings were Brahmins ( Gandhi’s father was also a Vazir in the darbar of the king of Porbandar ! ) It may be possible that the advisors of the Hindu kings were in contact with the Congress leaders who might have assured them of “ sweet treatment “ after the rule fell into the hands of Congress.

Now Mota comes to the point as far the structure of the society is concerned. He says on page No 172 first para , last three sentences , I put it verbatim for the benefit of the readers :

“ Even some remnants of the Kisan Sabhas and trade unions which had continued to

Be with the Congress lost their status and importance within the party. The party

was required to mould the people on the basis of traditional values – castes , com-

munities , linguism , etc. The nation state began to lose its progressive and modern

character. “ What a fall , dear friends , when the world was thirsting for socialism ,

equality , brotherhood , these Congress leaders wanted to take the society backwards , in a religious colonialism and imperialism of the Brahmins. This word would appear slightly unpalatable to some , but if the mechanics of imperialism is studied , one would realize that the Emperors all over the world did not physically control the subsidiary kings and the wider subjects but employed such means like appointing tributary-kings and feudal-Zamindars etc to control the masses given under their charge , who all would bow before the Emperor and pay him tributes on demand or voluntarily. Here the tributes assumed the form of daxina backed by scriptures. And all the while this game went unchallenged as the media was an accomplice in this game of deceipt , fraud and rank perfidy as it was also a part of the upper strata of the caste-system. When Congress was implementing this policy of duplicity , Nehru was shouting from the world-house tops championing the cause of the people of South Africa n Apartheid ! ) When slavery of a refined character was being imposed on the Scheduled Castes and the Tribes , he was making speeches against the slavery of the Blacks in African Congo , Nigeria, Uganda and elsewhere ,cunningly implying to the world that everything was alright in his country and India was playing part of a friend , philosopher and guide for all the discriminated people of the world ( of course , except India’s down-trodden and the deprived ! )

The greatness of Mota is very much visible if you read the paragraph No 3 on page 172. The congress’ thinking had gone astray underneath but outwardly it continued to play the card of respect for all religions , equality of all , brotherhood among all communities , tolerance etc. Mota designates this as “pluralism “.It was not as an aim to fight for but as a value and here its edge got blunted. It became a convenient vehicle “ respect for traditional leadership , respect for linguistic and regional chauvinism . This respect is also reflected in Govt. dominated programmes.Tha party was torn apart on account of the contradiction between the value of pluralism based on traditional groups and that of modern nationhood. .THE NATIONHOOD IS GRAFTED ON THE TRADITIONAL SOCIETY .( italics mine )

….The party’s commitment to these contradictory values has proved fatal because the value of pluralism localizes political power which endangers the process of nation building .Parochial groups have been seizing power in the states and the Central Government lives on perils of disintegration. “ Pluralism came to be interpreted selfishly in Hindu orthodox ways. Pluralism meant THAT PEOPLE OF ALL RELIGIONS HAD TO LIVE IN CO-EXISTENCE RESPECTING THE RIGHTS OF THE OTHER TO PROFESS AND FOLLOW THE RELIGIOUS BELIEF OF ONE’S CHOICE. The Hindu leaders and bureaucrats interpreted the term in a fashion convenient to them . That is the reason the Hindu ministers , public servants and even judges started behaving as if HINDUISM WAS THE OFFICIAL RELIGION OF THE STATE. Here Pluralism got official beating at the hands of the Hindu orthodox elements. This tendency is visible from Nehru’s time when the idols of Ram was secretly placed in the Babri Masjid in Ayodhya with the connivance of the official machinery , as after some time it was learnt the Dist Magistrate after retirement had joined the Jan Sangh. More, even Congress Government of Rajiv Gandhi had opened the doors of this Masjid for Hindu prayers in 1985 or so and within a very short time of 7 years BJP galvanized its own constituency all over India centering on the supposed rights of the Hindu over an alleged demolished Janmasthan of the Hindu God Ram within the premises of the Babri Masjid.

Iii

Mota adequately describes what was the true legacy of Nehru. He states following

1. Inadequate defence ( a shameful defeat at the hands of China in 1962) 2. Tormenting poverty 3. Dangers of parochialism and linguism in state politics 4. Declining party image and 5. Corruption at all levels of administration. Looking to the gravity of all the problems Nehru gave to the next generation there is little ground to feel proud of the so called achievements of Nehru’s regime which lasted from 1947 to 1964 nearly a generation.

Furthermore Mota describes how Congress failed to effectively prevent the forces of disintegration , the threats to the party and the nation state which came up 1. with Charan Singh who took up the cause of discontent among the Jat agriculture caste of Haryana, Punjab, Rajasthan and drove out Congress from the seat of power in U P 2. Shekh Abdulla in Kashmir , 3. Akali Dal in the aftermath of death of kairon in Punjab 4.Rise of Swatantra Party with connivance of ex-princes and landlords for whom the Coingress had diluted its social agenda 5. The D M K in Tamilnadu with separatist tendency which drove out the Congress from power ( this happened there on account of the well-galvanised organization of the DMK the organization which Congress had forgotten since decades ! The shocking observations come in the last following lines , “ All such parties had roots in some kind of parochialism and traditionalism Their rise to strength implies a breakdown of Gandhi- Nehru concept of nationalism . Their cumulative force reduced the Congress Party to a ghostly existence. “ After the advent to power Indira Gandhi depended on C P I for survival and wasted two precious years to identify the basic problem from which threat was emerging to the stabilityShe now got the answer and that was “ poverty ‘ so she gave a slogan “ Garibi Hatao “ now garibi was a problem , in Gandhi’s thinking garibi was not a problem but a blessing and poverty was like God , remember his word Daridra Narayan “ The garibs were asked to feel happy about their poverty as it was just a Godly virtue . People had accepted this Gandhian notion but saw that the ruling class and the businessmen and industrialists were not worshipping the poverty but were worshipping the Goddess of wealth Laxmi and their wealth was increasing leaps and bounds and yet they were asked by Gandhi to leave wealth to the prosperous sections of society and embrace poverty and feel happy about it , so they rejected this notion of Gandhi the Congress did not feel the true pulse of the masses and remained over confident of its contribution to the freedom and thought that the goodwill would last generations to generations but some leaders wanted to cash on this discontent and throwing all the norms of political finess to the wind , just jumped into the struggle and started mobilizing discontented masses and took away a major chunk of the popular support from the Congress and created their own political forts and Gandhism is noticed to suffer decline from this historical contradiction. Then people started raising questions over Gandhi’s other teachings too and since then Gandhism has not reclaimed the lost ground.

One should remember here how Kamal Abdel Pasha of Turkey built a nation replacing traditional society . That was a case quite extraordinary and he was a despot and state power was readily employed to carry out the ends of nation building. Here in India both , Gandhi and Nehru were democratic despots and had there been a sincere desire on either’s part India would have become a nation state long back aand might have made strides in economic and political spheres.

Then actually what went wrong ? Mota clarifies in his treatise that looking to the world currents , in the countries where nation states have come up to be built , there were traditional societies , then people accepted democracy Modernism does not come up on its own , but the change takes place in the minds of the people first and then the abstract principles get translated into reality but before that the traditional society is to be broken up , if it exists side by side with the industrial changes , then there would come some moments in history when this traditional loyalty will supplant the social , political and economical changes that have occurred so far. The traditional and modern can never co-exist they are world apart from each other. Here we allowed religion to remain stronger in the name of pluralism and craved for social changes to take place . We wanted peace and brotherhood but our scriptures were full of violence and fraternal conflicts like Mahabharat. We wanted social equality but Manusmruti taught that there can never be equality as all are created unequal and they are like head Brahmins ) Shoulders and arms ( kshatriyas ) body ( vashyas ) and the legs ( shudras ) The educated people , pleaders , have installed a statue of the author of Manu Smruti in the compound of the High Court in Rajasthan and it still remains there , even when the Constitution speaks of equality , brotherhood, and a society devoid of discriminations and injustices .

Take the case of jobs. We want removal of poverty , but do not want to recruit the SCs and STs in the government services , there are thousands of vacancies still lying vacant , there is a subterfuge conspiracy of designating certain posts as reserved for SCs or STs for which there is no likelihood for getting any candidate from these sections and then converting these posts as general and counting those posts which were so reserved as the posts of SC-STs. There is still an open conspiracy to harass and punish them without legal justification in respect of postings and promotions .There exist groupism on caste and province level in the administrative and police hierarchy .The government servants coming from down trodden sections of society as they can not get to the monopolizing segments as the savarnas do.This is the story of the people whom the Hindus consider them as part and parcel of the Hindu fold. The atrocities perpeptrated on the Muslims in some states are quite distressing like the incidents of 2002 in Gujarat . The violence also marked the agitation against the Reservation Policy in which the harijans were targeted.The upper castes violently resisted reservations to the Backward Classes , the shudras .

Congress went on winning one election after another , right from 1947 onwards , Nehru , Indira and Rajiv , won astounding numbers of seats in Lok Sabha. The election victory gave it opportunity to rule again and again , but it thought it was in recognition of the services Gandhi and Congress leaders had rendered to the people , Congress did not take up the opportunities to reform the economic and social systems , it remained satisfied with continuation of the society in other words , it sought to preserve the inward and outward form of the society , the “ castes “ remained castes and did not convert into “class “ because Constitution sought to eliminate castes as it was bane of the Hindu society , in stead of destroying this monstrous structure of society , the leaders played into the parameters of the arithmetic of winning elections and went on buttressing the caste system which was mandated to be destroyed by the Constitution adopted in 1949 and which became came fundamental law in 1950.The Congress leaders forgot everything about destroying the caste , as a result of which the lofty provisions contained in it were given a state burial , which reflected in the further monopolization of the industries , businesses , bureaucracy by the upper castes , the residential systems continued to be colonized still on the lines instructed by Manusmruti , the real wages of the downtrodden hardly compensated the poor to meet the needs of Roti , Kapda and Makan , not only that , the Manusmruti came to be enforced with greater jealousy and ferocity in the villages as a result of which legislations like “ Protection of Civil Rights Act came to be passed at the central level as in the wake of adoption of Constitution brotherhood , humanity among and towards the downtrodden did not appear . When Ambedkar was pressurized to submit to the fast of Gandhi in Nagpur in the year 1930 , Gandhi had undertaken this task of uplifting the social status of the harijans on behalf of the upper castes , and as a result of this blackmail Ambedkar agreed to drop his demand for separate constituencies for the harijans , this all vanished into thin air with the advent of the freedom not only that but the upper castes strengthened their stranglehold around the neck of the dalits and the adivasis . These sections waited enough , but their patience was construed as weakness and State power came to be used against them in the form of legalities, investigations and punishments in the name of law and order . Stability of the system in the name of maintenance of law and order became plank of all the parties. All forgot that the primary need was changing the tradition-bound society and not nourishing or showpiecing the parliamentary democracy was the ultimate aim of the change-over from the British Raj to the formation of a Republic . This change or parivartan involved addressing the basic needs of the poor as well doing away with the Hindu-discriminations of castes. A majority in the parliament was not sufficient guarantee of realizing the ambitions of the non-upper caste people. The Congress leaders did not guess the fight-back potential of the upper-castes when some advance in the social reforms was initiated as they rallied under this or that excuse , Mota has enlisted these factors on page No 175 pagraph 2 , stating Nav Nirman agitation of Gujarat and Jay Prakash Narayan’s agitation in Bihar. Take his statement “ Street action on the part of the opposition renders it ( the institution of parliamentary institution ) impotent. Neither the government nor the majority party can summon will to resist violent mass agitation. Here the use of state power matching the street violence is soft and selective , consider the amount and scale of state violence against the Naxalists during 2009 2010. The soft corner of the establishment towards the upper castes is quite visible here.

The mobilization of the upper-castes went unanswered by the Congress and here they missed the bus , or they had no leaders of that timber to match the increasing interference of the upper castes in the execution of the State’s social reform agenda. Once the upper castes gained upper hand in this chess game , they have not allowed loosening of the grip since then , take the case of Gujarat when Patels , who launched anti-reservation agitation in 1985 , sacrificed more that 100 youths , have remained in the forefront since then and their share in the power has been on the increase while the the share of the rest of the society has decresed until Narendra Modi managed to remove Keshu Patel from the seat of power.in 2001.

But how Congress faltered on this score ? It was their miscalculation that the social change can be brought about by governmental action only and the Organisation was not necessary for this exercise. If one thinks on the lines of the motivation of the change and mobilization of the people for whom the chane is to conceived and execute, one would clearly realize that without involving the beneficiaries in this task from the initial stage ,the opponents of the schemes would be emboldened to resist the change but if they are motivated to rise in defence of the reformations , the opponents would think hundreds times before resisting the change. This is a historical lesson in Gujarat. Congress gave 27 % reservations to the Mandal Panch communities in 1985 under the Chief Ministership of Madhavsingh Solanki.This was resisted by the upper castes and state-wide agitation was called by them . But the beneficiaries of the supposed change did not rise against this brow-beating by the upper castes and in the process , Madhavsingh ministry had to go. It was clearly the rightists’ victory. Let us remember Mota: “ They conceived government and not the party as a medium for realizing the goals of ideology and thus rendered the party impotent in matters of social change.Moreover Nehru conceived socialism , democracy , and secularism as the elementary values which alone can determine the structure of a modern society . Indira Gandhi echoed her father’s view . No doubt these are the necessary elements in the structure of modern ideology, but they can not fill the total space of the ideological structure.They lack the power of cohesiveness of the party. THE BASIS OF SOCIALISM IS CLASS CONSCIOUSNESS WHICH CANNOT FATHOM THE TOTALITY OF SOCIAL EXISTENCE. ( italics mine ). The basis of secularism is enlightenment and the intelligentia is the only group in which it can be realized in all its aspects. It was an extremely limited role outside this group. Such inadequacies of modern values have led some sensitive thinkers to invoke humanism as a principle of their unity. But humanism is abstract , conceives values through reason alone and tends to devalue emotions and passions. It is too remote for the purpose of releasing the common man’s energy for the fulfillment of the collective goals.In this connection the Russian experience is illuminating . In its early phase Russian Revolution encountered such paradoxes of humanism in its relationship with socialism , democracy and secularism and was compelled to push it to the back seat. It invoked the value of nationhood which stabilized the revolutionary sate by eliminating the excesses of the elementary values. However it is still groping for an appropriate form of nationalism which can incorporate these values. The skeptics may be reminded that nationhood is a value emerging within human history and as such it is not a cult which is ethically void. It still has a progressive role at least for people groping for a stable state. …………… To summarise: We as a people with history stand at its cross roads. The basic question we face is redefining the ideolological structure in the light of experiences of of the last seventy years ( This was written in The Radical Humanist, of Feb 1988 ) of our active and serious politics and use it to transform the political base particularly the party system. We have to pick up the debate of the 1950s on the issue of modernity versus tradition.The conclusions arrived then arte worthless so far as they assumed and affirmed the reconciliability of traditionalism and modernism.The Nehru-Gandhi formulation of principle of nationalism based on an appreciation of values of traditional social groups cannot be reconciled with the modern values of socialism , democracy and secularism. We have been trying to build our political institutions on the basis of their self-contradictory value system. They have naturally, proved to be too fragile. THE RESULTING ANARCHY PAVES A WAY FOR A REVOLUTIONARY CRISIS . And our only hope is such a crisis creates the conditions of its solution. No crisis in real history is perpetual.”

( page No 176- 177 )

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