It's time to reevaluate original and fake Gandhis
Shashi Tharoor's expertise in international diplomacy may be okay to be UN Chief, for which he contested, but has much to learn as a member of the Congress party. Spouting undesirable home truths about Nehru and Indira's policies just won't do.
SHASHI THAROOR’S expertise in international diplomacy may be suited to the position of UN Chief, for which he contested. It is incompatible with his new avatar as part of India’s politics - that too associated with the Congress party and its government. He recently pointed out a few home truths which were dubbed “Unpalatable remarks on original and fake Gandhis” by annoyed congress honchos. The position as Minister (MoS) of State for external affairs is indeed a prized post in India. The MoS can curry favours to members of the most pampered tribe, Indian Foreign Service. With no accountability and responsibility, IFS officers are posted abroad. Like the President, they are ceremonial entities but unlike the President, they start living like kings (or queens) even before completing a long innings of loyal service. The MoS can influence the posting of the IFS babus in some of the most desired capitals.
It is strange that Shashi Tharoor, the current MoS, faces open criticism by non-descript politicos. One such worthy is Janardan Dwivedi, the High Command loyalist of the Congress party and AICC media cell chairman. Dwivedi spoke on behalf his bosses: “It will take some time for Tharoor to understand Gandhi and Nehru in proper perspective.”
In fact, the august office, which naturally is as lucrative as it is influential, is not a big deal for its current occupant. Tharoor has been a career diplomat in key positions in the UN. He has the distinction of being a candidate for the top UN post last year. However, India’s perverted foreign policies, framed by the first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru, worked against him. He faced humiliating defeat in his bid essentially because India antagonized influential powers as well as every neighbour due to its big-power ambition.
Nehru aligned the country with the now-defunct Soviet Union in the guise of nonalignment. Dreaming of turning out into a great statesman arbitrating international disputes, he sought out the Soviets to the country’s peril. Rather than addressing extreme poverty and backwardness at home, he followed pro-Soviet economic policies pushing the country further backwards.
The provocation for Dwivedi’s outburst emanated from the minister’s remarks at a talk organized by the association of Indian diplomats and the Indian Council of World Affairs, which he chaired. The talk was delivered by political theoretician and Labour MP in Britain's House of Lords, Bhikhu Parekh. “Lord Parekh and I have fought alike on issues of India's identity and India's domestic arrangements as well... So we do, I am afraid, come from a similar outlook of the world,” Tharoor had stated adding, “I agree with Parekh's opinion on Nehru and Gandhi's foreign policies. It was more like a moralistic running commentary.”
The worldview of Lord Parekh offends holy cows worshipped by gullible Indians. He rightly said: “Nehru's policies gave India an exaggerated sense of self-importance and moral self-righteousness.
He even developed Indian foreign policy as though it was speaking for the whole of Asia, homogenizing the entire continent and ignoring internal conflicts.”
He also spoke of Nehru’s daughter Indira Gandhi who inherited the throne: “Indira's policies had no real desire to play a global role and shape the world. Her interests were more regional.” Naturally, sycophants of the Congress expressed surprise at Tharoor's comments seen as criticism of Nehru's foreign policy. Shakeel Ahmed, another Congressman acting as a spokesman for the party boss, said: “I am very surprised by the style of Tharoor.
He is a member of the Congress and his responsibility is to carry forward the legacy of Pandit Nehru and not to be critical of it.” It is by a quirk of fate that Tharoor receives advice from such non-entities. His international background in diplomacy may be impeccable but the expertise is incompatible with his new avatar as a congress top gun. He has been made deputy chief in an establishment that still lives in a cold war time warp and suffers from megalomania. The stark fact is that India (and Pakistan too) stands by the white lie that the British would never have left their colonies but for the so-called freedom struggle.
One cannot have a sensible worldview while being a part of the establishment that is founded on deceit. Even the fierce nationalist right wing parties like BJP or Shiv Sena claiming to be of the pure-bred Aryan super-race and the left wing ideologues including Marxists subscribe to this basic lie. They all project the patriarch of the movement MK Gandhi as the 'Father of the Nation'. In reality, the 'strugglers' were financed by big business tycoons to inherit the colony, usurping power from descendents of original rulers.
The ruling clique stifled private enterprise and new technology through licence-permit-quota raj. The tycoons were permitted to retain their empires and thrive with only inept public sector competition to contend with. All Indian politicos hail Gandhi's bizarre hypocrisy of anti-development rhetoric as an ever-relevant panacea for the world's problems. He decorates the Indian Rupee currency in a world of global commerce, crashing international trade barriers and multilateral development agencies. Descendants of Gandhi’s protégé Nehru lead the plunder currently.
They have cunningly assumed even the Gandhi name. As a result of mega budgets from the exchequer, several world leaders confuse the fake Gandhis as indeed the kin of the original Gandhi. The neo-Gandhis are no lesser hypocrites and that makes Tharoor a perfect misfit for India. However, signs are that the diplomat is sincere about being successful in the Indian politico. He made a start and diplomatically distanced himself from the stark reality. A stock statement in the arsenal of ‘netas’ was promptly issued, saying, ‘My remarks have been distorted...I am pained at the inaccurate reporting.’
Nehru aligned the country with the now-defunct Soviet Union in the guise of nonalignment. Dreaming of turning out into a great statesman arbitrating international disputes, he sought out the Soviets to the country’s peril. Rather than addressing extreme poverty and backwardness at home, he followed pro-Soviet economic policies pushing the country further backwards.
The provocation for Dwivedi’s outburst emanated from the minister’s remarks at a talk organized by the association of Indian diplomats and the Indian Council of World Affairs, which he chaired. The talk was delivered by political theoretician and Labour MP in Britain's House of Lords, Bhikhu Parekh. “Lord Parekh and I have fought alike on issues of India's identity and India's domestic arrangements as well... So we do, I am afraid, come from a similar outlook of the world,” Tharoor had stated adding, “I agree with Parekh's opinion on Nehru and Gandhi's foreign policies. It was more like a moralistic running commentary.”
The worldview of Lord Parekh offends holy cows worshipped by gullible Indians. He rightly said: “Nehru's policies gave India an exaggerated sense of self-importance and moral self-righteousness.
He even developed Indian foreign policy as though it was speaking for the whole of Asia, homogenizing the entire continent and ignoring internal conflicts.”
He also spoke of Nehru’s daughter Indira Gandhi who inherited the throne: “Indira's policies had no real desire to play a global role and shape the world. Her interests were more regional.” Naturally, sycophants of the Congress expressed surprise at Tharoor's comments seen as criticism of Nehru's foreign policy. Shakeel Ahmed, another Congressman acting as a spokesman for the party boss, said: “I am very surprised by the style of Tharoor.
He is a member of the Congress and his responsibility is to carry forward the legacy of Pandit Nehru and not to be critical of it.” It is by a quirk of fate that Tharoor receives advice from such non-entities. His international background in diplomacy may be impeccable but the expertise is incompatible with his new avatar as a congress top gun. He has been made deputy chief in an establishment that still lives in a cold war time warp and suffers from megalomania. The stark fact is that India (and Pakistan too) stands by the white lie that the British would never have left their colonies but for the so-called freedom struggle.
One cannot have a sensible worldview while being a part of the establishment that is founded on deceit. Even the fierce nationalist right wing parties like BJP or Shiv Sena claiming to be of the pure-bred Aryan super-race and the left wing ideologues including Marxists subscribe to this basic lie. They all project the patriarch of the movement MK Gandhi as the 'Father of the Nation'. In reality, the 'strugglers' were financed by big business tycoons to inherit the colony, usurping power from descendents of original rulers.
The ruling clique stifled private enterprise and new technology through licence-permit-quota raj. The tycoons were permitted to retain their empires and thrive with only inept public sector competition to contend with. All Indian politicos hail Gandhi's bizarre hypocrisy of anti-development rhetoric as an ever-relevant panacea for the world's problems. He decorates the Indian Rupee currency in a world of global commerce, crashing international trade barriers and multilateral development agencies. Descendants of Gandhi’s protégé Nehru lead the plunder currently.
They have cunningly assumed even the Gandhi name. As a result of mega budgets from the exchequer, several world leaders confuse the fake Gandhis as indeed the kin of the original Gandhi. The neo-Gandhis are no lesser hypocrites and that makes Tharoor a perfect misfit for India. However, signs are that the diplomat is sincere about being successful in the Indian politico. He made a start and diplomatically distanced himself from the stark reality. A stock statement in the arsenal of ‘netas’ was promptly issued, saying, ‘My remarks have been distorted...I am pained at the inaccurate reporting.’
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