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Ramachandra
Guha, the writer of ‘India After Gandhi: The
History of the World’s Largest Democracy’ has
made some reference about JP. In the interview
published in Outlook, May 7, 2007, he is quoted
to say, ‘Mrs Gandhi had the instruments of state
at her command and because she grossly abused
them through the Emergency, she would be the
greater culprit. But one can’t let JP off the
hook either. One placed too much faith in the
state, and the other placed too little faith in
the state and in representative institutions.
One said I am Parliament, I am India, the other
said disband Parliament. I’ve tried to provide a
psycho-social interpretation of why JP acted the
way he did. I’ve talked about the fact that he
was growing old, his wife had died, he wanted to
recapture the youthful revolutionary impulses
that he once had, he felt his mortality was in
question and India had to be transformed before
he went. I tried to understand why a man who
abjured radical politics for 30 years to become
a social worker, had become a street agitator. I
also quote other mistakes. These are
contemporary criticisms – I mention a man called
RR Patil, an ICS officer, a friend of JP's, who
visits Bihar, studies the movement, and says,
the genie is out of the bottle, and you can’t
control it. You may have unleashed forces that
will destroy institutions. There were other
critics, like Acharya Ramamurthi, he talks about
the RSS taking over the movement. JP was naďve,
he was irresponsible, and of course Indira
Gandhi over-reacted.’
I am sure many of the intellectuals who were
associated with JP’s movement were also from
Bihar. Many of them may be alive. Will it not be
in public interest to discuss this controversial
statement that many of the followers and friends
of JP may not be able to digest? Will it not be
prudent for those connected with JP closely to
come out with their views if they think
otherwise?
Since last so many years, the political
leadership in Bihar has been claiming themselves
as the disciples of JP, it becomes their duty to
do a justice to JP who is no more there to fend
his side.
I wish the issue is taken up by the
intellectuals in right spirit, if Guha has
wrongly come to his conclusion.
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Comments: |
It is a relevant debate. Indeed, the
institutions got destroyed. Question
is, was it because of JP or in spite
of him.
When JP launched his movement, in an
effort to woo the students away, the
govt allowed them to sit in exams
with full freedom to copy. When
Bihar Univ senate showed some spine,
the Govt put a bureaucrat as OSD and
superseded them. In all this, JP was
but a private citizen, a leader of
the masses.
I would put a bigger share of the
blame on him when he chose the
geriatric Morarji who was known as
an inflexible person as the PM. He
could have chosen the idealistic
Chandrashekhar or the able Jagjiwan
Ram. The government could not last
the full term. In Bihar, the private
medical and engineering colleges got
nationalised under Karpoori Thakur.
Thus a model that was ahead of
Karnataka got nipped in the bud.
Where would Bihar have been if the
colleges were allowed to flourish?
Would Patna have been the IT hub of
India? Who knows? - Thakur Vikas
Sinha - May 6, 2007
Jaiprakash Narayan (JP) is a
pathetic figure in Indian politics.
A great patriot, fearless
revolutionary, and an original
thinker, JP failed to visualize his
vision into reality due to lack of
organizational ability on his part.
He was a foremost freedom fighter
and gladly suffered hardships,
deprivations and tortures. After
independence, through his Socialist
Party, he tried to participate in
the political process. But the
defeat of the party in 1950 poll
damped his spirits and he took
political sanyas only to resurface
again as a critic. He hurled abuse
at Sardar Patel under the
instigation of his mentor PM Nehru.
But it goes to the credit of JP that
he realized his mistake and
apologized for his vituperation
against Sardar Patel. After Patel’s
death, Nehru had no use of him and
being sidetracked by his mentor, JP
became hostile to the Nehru
government. He joined the Bhoodan
Movement only to forsake it later
on. He unsuccessfully played the
role of a mediator first, between
Dr. Phizo of Assam and the
government and then between Kashmiri
leader Sheikh Abdullah and the
government. When he was full of
energy and vigor, he wasted his time
in touring foreign countries and
harping on his sacrifices for the
nation. He gave vent to this
attitude at the convocation of the
Magadh University in 1969, where he
was awarded an honorary degree. All
his expenses were met by
industrialists- a bolt on his
socialism.
During Mrs. Gandhi’s regime, he
thought of becoming an elder
statesman, but Mrs. Gandhi rebuffed
him. As his censure of the
government galloped, Mrs. Gandhi
rebuked him for by saying. “Those
who live on the largesse of others
should not criticize others.” This
was a last straw and he intensified
his vendetta against the government
leading to the imposition of
emergency- a dark chapter in Indian
history. Both Mrs. Gandhi and JP
share the blame for the foisting of
emergency upon the nation. JP wanted
to dismantle the government through
agitation and Mrs. Gandhi tried to
retain her gaddi. JP’s Total
Revolution did not fly at all. -
Satya - May 7, 2007
The problem with JP was that he was
extremely brilliant and intellect
but still he will be known as great
pujari of socialism.
Nationalisation of Bihar's four
medical colleges was made by Dr.
Jagannath Mishra, not by Karpoori
Thakur. Thakur distributed
government jobs to engineers in
Gandhi Maidan. - Ranjan Rituraj
Sinh - May 8, 2007
I am shocked to note that the issue
raised about the JP’s legacy didn’t
get the response desired,
particularly in media. Why have the
senior journalists such as Kuldip
Nair, Inder Mehrotra, and even Arun
Shourie not given their views on the
Ram Chandra Guha’s remarks in
Outlook? Is it because over the
years JP has lost his ground in
Bihar for the caste-bias and in
India because he is no more relevant
because of alliance politics? -
Indra - May 9, 2007
Though I have not read Ramchandra
Guha's book - here are the points
documented by Sudhanshu Ranjan in
his biography on JP. And this
psychoanalysis of Guha sounds absurd
to me.
1. In late 60s based on massive
price rise and corruption he got
disenchanted with the govt.
policies. He had felt that it will
be in the interest of democracy if
Congress loses in few states. Sheikh
Abdullah visits Patna in 1968 and
tells JP that India's ship is stuck
in whirlpool and JP is standing
aside and watching it (he had given
oath to Binova to not get into
active politics). JP's response was
- though I can not get into the well
of politics I am diving into the
people ocean (this is 3 years before
death of his wife). In 1967 election
due to Student movement effect in
Bihar - for the first time a
non-congress govt. (in the whole of
India) was formed in Bihar under
Mahamaya Prasad. And due to lack of
'dal-badal kanoon' Indira Gandhi
systematically kept destroying
winning parties in Bihar and got
Abdul Ghafoor.
2. Then umpteen times students went
and asked him to lead the movement
starting from Gujrat to Bihar. He
was inspired by the student
movements taking place in France in
1968 and earlier in other countries
like Venezuela, Turkey, South Korea
and Japan. He took Binova into
confidence and said due to
circumstances - there is a need for
revolution - it is not that he
wanted it like that but the
situation demands it. After 3-4
years of providing passive support
he got into active support only in
early 1974.
3. JP criticizes police firing of 19
March 1974 and also criticizes the
violence by unsocial elements. And
he says he cannot stand mute to
corruption and bad governance. This
is not why he fought in freedom
movement.
4. On 31 March 1974 - Indira
criticizes him in Bhuvaneswar
stating that those who have
relationships and gets favor from
rich and industrialist - how can
they be talking of corruption.
5. On 9 April 1974 - he gives
details of his expense and explains
that his father had 105 acres of
land and half of it belonged to him.
He has kept only 16 acres and have
donated the rest. He also gets Rs
400 thru Magsaysay award per month.
His furniture are given by Prof.
Gyanchand. He does take help from
friends. And he says people in
political life do need to take help
for sustenance. And even Mahatma
Gandhi did it.
6. After the death of Prabhavati
Devi - there were some very personal
letters written by Kamala Nehru to
her - which people wanted to publish
in a memorial called 'Prabha' but he
meets Indira Gandhi gave all the
letters to her. Her reaction was
'you only could do this'. Their
differences were public.
7. After 1977 elections formation of
government formation he goes to
Indira Gandhi and says 'Indu - This
is democracy. Do not get perturbed.
Do not stop public service. That is
the biggest Dharma'. She had tears
in her eyes and she came to the gate
to see him off.
My opinion JP was a man of
character, morality and visionary.
Mr. Guha, please do not do
unnecessary psychoanalyze. Just put
the facts as a historian. It's very
easy to do character assassination
for media attention and for sales.
Is this another case of
'intellectual beating' of a leader
from Bihar? - Naveen Kumar Sharma
- May 10, 2007
I have not read this book either.
Nobody even Guha hasn’t doubted JP’s
morality and integrity towards his
fight against corruption and social
democratization in its entirety. I
have great respect for him, but
minus Total Revolution.
30 years down the line, if one has
analyze this so called Total
Revolution, a great movement started
for the greater cause for younger
generation of early 1970s proved to
be a disastrous movement for several
states, especially Bihar and UP.
Although he (JP) started his
campaign to fight against
corruption, but soon it lost its
momentum within one year and
movement directed much greater
momentum against Indira Gandhi
regime. The so called students’
movement lost the battle and caught
into the lap of various political
parties such as Bhartiya Lok Dal,
Socialist Party, Swatantra Party,
RSS, Bhartiya Jan Sangh, and other
local outfits and deserter like
Jagjivan Ram, who wanted to cut
their larger share of “power cake”,
(parties in waiting). That is why
the new government under the
leadership of Morarji Desai fell
apart within 2 and half years. The
greed craved amongst them, and
everyone started acting as a Prime
Minister. The second generation
leaders of this movement proved
their skill no better than their
senior counterparts. In fact, they
were much worse. There was no
community service. The intellectual
ideology of JP was crushed, used and
thrown by others. Please list me the
single achievement of this total
revolution what I call a most
infamous movement which continued
corruption and crime abetting, even
both increased manifold. Please name
any single corrupt civil servants,
engineers and doctors or
“rickshawalla-thellawala” went to
jail.
Where was the fight against
corruption?
What I derive from here, that their
behaviors (new pack of leaders of
India in 1977) at such a sorry state
of India doused the fire of several
hundred thousands of intellectuals
who were fighting with great
generosity against corruption,
rising crime and rising price of
essential commodities. The very
narrow-end of total revolution
compelled many Indians to evolve
them with individualism. Since then
Indian and Individualism are
synonym.
In today context (by 2007), the role
of JP from 1974 to 1979 (till his
death) should be considered ‘null
and void’. I (personally) think we
can give greater justice to JP’s
role in India’s modernization if we
delete his rabble-rousing act of
defensible violence which crept into
our society (in Bihar) vociferously,
which made our society loud and
violence-linked. The fight against
emergency brought a new pattern
“no-work culture” and thereby a
system-failure for our state.
Are we not a great loser, at this
moment? - Dr. Sudhir Ranjan, USA
- May 11, 2007 |
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