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October     Last updated: October 28: 7:00 p.m.

Cabbages & Kings
V. P. Bhatia

The Wages of Nehruvian Pacifism

How the times change! What a devaluation of the icons of altruism whose ideas have reigned supreme for most past of the last century in India. The truth has been brought home to me suddenly on the Gandhi Jayanti Day over the years, but this year more particularly. Which reminds me of the American-turned-British Nobel Prize Winning poet's famous lines in his long poem The Wasteland: A heap of broken images, where the sun beats, And the dead tree gives no shelter, the cricket no relief, And the dead stones no sound of relief water. Which also reminded me of a noted Hindi litterateur's comment in a magazine (Dharmayug) article a few years ago... that there must be some serious lacuna or lacunas in the thoughts and practices of Gandhi and Nehru that the nation has come to such a moral, economic and intellectual decline in just a few decades of independence despite almost total stranglehold of their idealistic mantras. There is a sort of open rebellion against an intellectual straitjacket which inhibited independent thinking beyond a western and pseudo-Indian model of reconstruction and development.

In particular, as another eminent columnist said in The Sunday Times of India, the new generation is no longer prepared to “turn the other cheek”. And lo and behold, as if the expression of this home truth was not sufficient in the print media, I found it actually turned into a comic scene and a parody in a TV serial on the day of the Gandhi Jayanti this year when I was confronted with an unbelievably satirical scene as I opened my TV set by chance, and found a male character slapped for some reason, jocularly turning the other check to a lady character, asking her to slap the other side also. When asked by a nearby standing friend why he was asking for it, he replied, “Because it is Gandhi Jayanti today.” So, he was ‘turning the other cheek’ in rememberance of the great man's teachings! Perhaps, this is the only thing that the younger generation knows about him. It was of course all pure fun, a sort of social and political criticism in a hilarious way. There are others more serious ones, who have pinned the blame for the stark reality of the all-round decline of the nation, from which it has only now started recovering in a painful way, though also helped simultaneously by the conjunction of a number of lucky circumstances.

To quote from my latest reading. the eminent Indian editor Frank Moraes's memoirs— Witness To An Era (Vikas Publishing House, New Delhi-6, 1973): “The inordinate value Gandhi attached to austerity, asceticism and poverty unwittingly bred an atmosphere of phariseeism (hypocrisy) in the Congress. The haste with which the overwhelming majority of Congressmen abandoned their posts of service for posts of power when independence came shows how skin-deep was their attachment to these values. Tagore strongly disagreed with Gandhi about making a fetish of the ascetic life: he wrote lyrically of the joyous life and saw no special virtue in cultivating asceticism as a way of living. Nor did Nehru.” In short, he set pseudo-saintly, propagandist standards which were flouted in no time, so that his followers, particularly his aristocratic heir, lurched to the other extreme. The Congress became corrupt even before independence as it ran for power in the 1937 and again in 1945-46, so that he wanted it to be disbanded in 1947. However, the Mahatma's particular failure was on the non-violence and communal unity front which he refused to admit in his typical obstinate way, faithfully followed by his political heir more obstinately, neglecting even vital defence and security matters, reducing India to second class power. An unworldly dogmatic pacifism has humiliated India more than once—in 1962 at Chinese hands and in the last decade again by Pakistan's proxy war, emboldening the chronically antagonistic communal elements once again in Kashmir and elsewhere.

In fact, the nation has been living on a plethora of secular and pacifist lies. But the cost has been tremendous by way of slow-bleeding, making the task of development and care for the burgeoning, bloating numbers of the poor more and more difficult and unmanageable, especially in a ‘train of natural calamities.

Glamorous TV ads fuel mass frustrations

The country has been facing it all heroically as almost one man, but the problems multiply. Globalisation and sudden spurt in Information Technology or even the presence of the world's largest middle class, not to speak of a sizeable extra-rich, affluent, spend thrift upper crust of five per cent given to extravagant exhibitionism and glamorous pursuits cannot hide the fact that we harbour the largest number of the poor also and that the state of even basic infrastructure is appalling at almost every level. Beneath the glittering facade of IT revolution and globalisation there is a powder keg of cynical frustrations and explosive expectations. As a mediaman journalist put it pithily in the words of an embittered jobless youth. “Our hearts feel like being cut into pieces when we see the lavish life-styles of the careless rich and display of ever more fanciful consumer goods advertised on the TV channels.

” Coming to another of my recent readings, the following extract from a letter written by John F. Kennedy, supposedly a pro-India American President, who was slain in 1963, in response to Jawaharlal Nehru's abject appeal for immediate military aid to contain the Chinese onslaught against India in October 1962, makes an interesting reading for being a counter sermon to a habitual sermoniser and peacenik about the elementary truth—that a flamboyant foreign policy and peaceful professions are no substitute for a strong defence-preparedness in the cynical world of power politics. As B.K. Nehru, then India's ambassador in USA writes in his memoirs Nice Guys Finish Second, Nehru's letter dated October 26, 1962 requesting immediate military supplies including over 100 planes which he was supposed to deliver to President Kennedy was couched in such humiliating language that it made him weep. Kennedy's reply, agreeing to help India in the hour of its direst need, was as follows:

Dear Mr Prime Minister,

Your ambassador handed me your letter last night. The occasion of it is difficult and painful one for you and a sad one for the whole world. Yet there is a sense in which I welcome your letter, because it permits me to say to you what has been in my mind since the Chinese communists have begun to press their aggressive attack into Indian territory. I know I can speak for my whole country, when I say that our sympathy in this situation is whole heartedly with you. You have displayed an impressive degree of forbearance. and patience in dealing with the Chinese.

You have put into practice what all great religious teachers have urged and so few of their followers have been able to do. Alas, this teaching seems to be effective only when it is shared by both sides in a dispute! I want to give you support as well as sympathy. This is a practical matter and, if you wish my ambassador in New Delhi (Galbraith) can discuss with you and the officials of your government what we can do to translate our support into terms that are practically most useful to you as soon as possible. With all sympathy for India and warmest personal good wishes.

Sincerely,
John F. Kennedy

(Vide Lal Bahadur Shastri by C.P. Srivastava, Viking Publishers, P. 160) the italicised words above show it was as gentle an indictment of Nehru's ‘peace at any cost’ policies as possible, despite a decade long Chinese hostility to India since the overrunning of Tibet in 1950 under deceptive professions of peace. The irony is that Nehru knew the Chinese intentions and yet lived in a world of make-believe that his international status as leader of the non-aligned movement and his personal charisma could work miracles, as Gandhi too fondly believed himself as a man of miracles vis-a-vis the Muslim League's supremo. Surrender, both thought, was the best way to win friendship. However, in practical terms, it amounted to what Lala Lajpat Rai wrote to Gandhiji about the latter's damning tendency of “insiting that we should love our enemies while we may hate our friends”.

Anyway, Nehru's dogmatic China policy, based on the premise that a socialist country could not commit aggression, his half-hearted defence policy and non-alignment which he had turned into an ‘anti-imperialist’ platform for anti-western tirades had collapsed, so that eating the humble pie, he had to ask for urgent supply of “twelve all-weather fighter squadrons (of nearly 100 planes) to be manned by Americans for operations over India and two B-217 squadrons to be manned by Indians.” Thus the great philosopher of non-alignment and pacifism had to ask for not only American planes but also for American pilots to operate in India. It is another matter that the Chinese withdrew ‘unilaterally’ after a month of aggression and the promised western military aid was reduced to a trickle, consisting of no planes but only light equipment and some radar installations useful only for mountain fighting, to prevent its being used against Pakistan. Kennedy’s assassination a year later too ended the matter. In any case, the Americans considered India's list for military hardware too exaggerated. However, it dramatically highlighted how Nehru's pacifism had left India's defence preparedness fifteen years behind time. “As he himself admitted rather relucantly we had spent less on defence.” The matter was aggravated by his abnoxious, ideologically-hidebound Defence Minister. Incidentally, the Soviets refused to come to India's aid in this hour of crisis.

* * *

The terrible shock of this all-round collapse of his make-believe world. Nehru killed him spiritually and mentally, though he physically died 19 months later. India's military prestige prestige was retrieved 16 months later by Lal Bahadur Shastri, when “the tallest decision” to cross into Pakistani Punjab to smash its war machine was taken by “the shortest man”. Ironically, the plan to cross the international border was drawn up in Nehru's time in 1948 but implemented only in 1965, allowing 17 years of valuable time to Pakistan to grow into a Frankenstein's monster with western help, instead of nipping the evil in the bud. Incidentally, it is ironic to note that Nehru was thinking of divesting Sardar Patel of the portfolio of the States Ministry or even forcing him out of the Cabinet after his successful police action in Hyderabad because the painless operation of the integration of over 500 states by him had strengthened his hold over the Congress organisation, as was shown by Tandon's election as Congress President in mid-1950, despite Nehru's public opposition. Unlike Kashmir, he had to hand over the Hyderabad problem to Patel at the insistence of his cabinet colleagues. Otherwise, he alongwith his alter ego Mountbatten were ready to give ‘special status' to Hyderabad also. Patel was not dropped only because Nehru knew he was a ‘dying man’.

When Nehru wanted to sack Sardar Patel

Though Patel's health was deteriorating, he had decided to challenge Nehru's China policy in Congress Working Committee especially in regard to silence over Chinese annexation of Tibet in October 1950, about which he had warned Nehru a year earlier. In a letter to him, he had asked him not to recognise China till India's interests were safeguarded in Tibet. Nehru in turn asked him to mind his own business. Patel wrote another long letter to Nehru on what to do about our northern defences in November 1950. But unfortunately the ailing Sardar died a month later and the showdown in CWC never came.

* * *

Giving an overall assessment of the achievement of Lal Bahadur Shastri's steely leadership ordering the Indian Army to launch a counter-attack on Pakistan and march towards Lahore and Sialkot during the September 1965 Indo-Pakistan War, Lt. Gen. Harbaksh Singh, the then GoC of the Western Command, writes in his War Despatches, Indo-Pakistan Conflict 1965 (Lancers, New Delhi 1991): “The illusion that Pakistan could steamroll into India with the help of gifted American equipment had been replaced by a hearty respect for the Indian jawan who forced the opponent to the knees in a straight contest. Our slow, simple and ponderous tanks, nicknamed ‘Ancient Hulls’ challenged and vanquished the ultra-modern Pattons to rub in the lesson that in the ultimate test of battle it is the man behind the gun that counts. The Pak Army was, in short, cut to size.

Shastri retrieved India's prestige

“And there is yet another achievement that overshadows all.

The humiliation heaped upon the Indian Army at home and abroad, consequent upon the NEFA debacle in 1962 had always ramkled deep in our minds and made us bend our heads in shame. This slur had been wiped out. In the eyes of the nation, the army ensured a prestige rarely equalled before. To the world at large it has re-established its traditional fame. Within the army itself our faith has been restored. These are mighty gains, far greater than any stretch of enemy territory or the destruction of her military potential.” In fact, as admitted by Gen. Ayub Khan's then Information Secretary Altaf Gauhar in his memoirs, after the utter rout of Pakistan's Ist Armoured Division in the Khem Karan offensive, costing it destruction or loss of 97 Patton tanks, war was practically over for Pakistan on September 11, 1965, though the ceasefire came 12 days later. In contrast, what was the situation after the NEFA debacle in October-November 1962, under Prime Minister Nehru from which Shastri redeemed the nation? There was demoralisation from top to bottom.

Nehru himself had suffered such deep shock that not only his health deteriorated rapidly, he lost even “the will to live”, as even his sister Vijay Lakshmi Pandit lamented. A friend of veteran journalist Frank Morales remarked to him, “Nehru really died two years before his actual death. He died on the day the Chinese crossed our borders.” As the Chinese mounted attack, “Gone was non-alignment. Now military aid was welcome from any quarter.” In this context, two eminent writers have painted the ‘picture of pity’ that Jawaharlal Nehru had become in his last days. One is that given by Gen. S.S.P. Thorat who was superseded for the post of Army Chief after retirement of Gen. Thimayya in 1961. As Corps Commander of NEFA, Thorat had prepared a plan to meet the Chinese challenge but was bypassed and retired to favour the mediocre, Gen. P.N. Thapar. In fact, so headstrong Krishna Menon and Nehru's favourite ‘political general’ B.M. Kaul had become that they were on a look out for a pretext to shunt out even Manekshaw (then a Brigadier).

He was ‘A Picture of Pity’ after the Chinese attack

However, when after the debacle, Thorat sought time and went to meet Nehru, he was filled with pity to see him so haggard and woe-begone. Nehru sat aimlessly for sometime in his chair cutting a cigaratte into small pieces with scissors. After long silence, he asked Thorat, What went wrong? As once reported by Manohar Malgonkar in the Statesman, Thorat replied he really couldn't say as he was forced to quit a year before the Chinese attack. But, says Thorat in his memoirs, the contrast between present and past Nehru shook him to the bones. Another graphic picture of Nehru's last days is drawn by former Indian diplomat Budruddin Tyabji (in his Memoirs of An Egoist), as he called on him in his last year after he had delegated all his authority to Lal Bahadur Shastri in January 1964. As Tyabji sat waiting in his first floor sitting room, Nehru came walking very slowly almost dragging, his feet into the room. How ill and discoloured he looked! He gave a pale smile with a swollen face. He sat there, saying nothing and silence became unbearable in that large room”. At last Tyabji said, now that he had delegated many responsibilities he must have enough time to concentrate on large issues. But Nehru raplied, now he had more time than he knew what to do with it. At last, Tyabji took leave, haunted by the memory of once charismatic leader now completely played out. A Nation living on Secular Lies Kennedy's counter-sermon to Nehru after the NEFA debacle.