New Delhi, Oct 10:In many ways we are a fickle nation. We make heroes and gods out of ordinary people and forget them with equal ease after they are gone. Probably the best example in recent times is that of Indira Gandhi. In life she cut a towering figure, winning wars, fighting poverty and uniting a fractious nation, or so her spin doctors maintained. And even her severest critics would not deny the hold she had on the popular imagination, evoking comparisons with Durga and the mother incarnate.
Yet months almost, after her death, the hoardings and photographs seemed to virtually disappear from public places as the nation prepared to deify her son. Her death created a massive sympathy vote and led to brutal riots in the capital yet, after the initial shock was over, a country that had seemed shattered by her assassination and ill equipped to cope rushed unhesitatingly into the 21st century led by a former pilot and his techno-savvy friends. And that too turned out to be just a phase. After Rajiv Gandhi, we have had a Congress led by a non-Gandhi, coalition governments, the BJP brand of politics so on and so forth. It seems a very long time indeed since anybody could have dreamed up the line, ‘India is Indira’.
For many people of my generation, for instance, it is primarily through the prism of the Emergency that we saw Indira Gandhi. The months of suppression, censorship and suspension of civil liberties and the triumphant ouster of the Congress was probably a bit like what the Independence movement might have been to our predecessors. And Mrs Gandhi emerged not surprisingly as a demonic figure, one who could do no right. Two decades on, however, one is prepared perhaps to be a bit more sympathetic. The facts may be well known but there are details, such as a description of her being the only child wearing khadi in a school full of smartly dressed kids, that convey vividly the mix of high expectations and isolation that characterised her childhood and probably contributed to making her the extraordinarily driven individual that she was.

So is she the saviour we need today in our current state of turmoil?

It is tempting to believe that. Given our experience of squabbling politicians, an ageing leader and a divisive agenda, it is extremely tempting to hanker after the dream of an authoritarian figure who would cut through the maze, take decisive steps, go to war if need be, offer immediate action and instant protection. It would be tempting if one chose to forget the burning eighties: the wave of Khalistan-related terrorist attacks in Punjab and elsewhere, the carnage in Assam, the rise of the LTTE and its impact in Tamil Nadu, the problems in Kashmir and so on, all of which Gandhi appeared to be unable to control. The problem with remembering people through their names alone is that only the myth endures. As we approach another death anniversary of this controversial leader it is time perhaps to consider more complex ways of remembering.
Bureau Report