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Gandhi Family Traditions
Kanwaljit Singh Gill
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The vitriolic hate campaign of Varun
Gandhi has revived interest in the traditions of the Gandhi
family. Kanwaljit Singh Gill of
Surrey,
Canada
recapitulates the life and times of the Gandhis and their
relationship with the Sikhs. Without mincing words, he bares the
façade of the tradition which India is so fond of boasting. |
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 For the last few
days I have read various news articles about Varun Gandhi's
political statement. He just tried to be popular Hindu political
leader of BJP and didn't care about the feelings of the minorities.
Another thing of intrest was that Priyanka and Rahul Gandhi
criticised their cousion Varun for breaking the Gandhi family
tradition by making such hateful statement against the minorities.
I agree with
Priyanka and Rahul Gandhi that Varun did break the Gandhi family
tradition. Varun Gandhi's grand mother Indira Gandhi and uncle Rajiv
Gandhi never made such hateful statements against the minorities.
They established Gandhi family tradition of making good statements
in favour of minorities and fighting for their rights but at the
same time hurting the minorities to achieve their petty political
ends following a silent revenge policy.
The current
phase of the Gandhi traditions started with Mrs. Indira Gandhi. She
started her venture by attacking the
Golden Temple in
June 1984 and killing thousands of innocent Sikhs. and Rajivv Gandhi
continued the Gandhi family tradition by justifying the masscare of
thousands of innocent Sikhs in Delhi in 1984 and not punishing the
people who were involved in the killings of innocent Sikhs.
Now Sonia Gandhi
and Rahul Gandhi are carrying on the Gandhi family tradition by
apoligising for the innocent killings on one side and at the same
time giving tickets to Jagdish Tytler and Sajjan Kumar, the people
found guilty of innocent killings by Nanavati Commision.
This is the real
Gandhi Family Tradition –pretend and foster nicety towards
minorities and simultaneously continue the hate and hurt campaign,
but be intelligent and clever enough to do that craftily and
quietly.
Varun Gandhi
should get smart and learn the Gandhi family traditions more
carefully. He should learn the simple schemata of hurting with
actions while remaining mum in public and media, which are the core
values of the Gandhi family traditions.
 Let us go a
little back in history. To really understand the Gandhi family
tradition of saying the nice things about minorities and
discriminating against them at the same time we should start with
family's founder Pandit. Nehru. Before India's independence in 1947
Panditt Nehru and other Congress leaders promised special
constitutional rights to Sikhs but soon after the independence Nehru
backed away from all those promises. Not only that whereas
India
accepted various states based on differant languages and those
languages recognised as the main language in those states. But the
moment Sikhs asked that Punjabi should be given similar status in
Punjab, Jawaharlal Nehru dithered, simply because Punjabi was
considered as the language of the Sikh community. As long as he was
alive, he did not allow Punjabi to be recognised as the official
language of Punjab.
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Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi are carrying on the Gandhi family
tradition by apoligising for the innocent killings on one
side and at the same time giving tickets to Jagdish Tytler and
Sajjan Kumar, the people found guilty of innocent killings by
Nanavati Commision. This is the real Gandhi Family Tradition –
pretend and foster nicety towards minorities and simultaneously
continue the hate and hurt campaign, but be intelligent and
clever enough to do that craftily and quietly. |
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It was only
after his death that the next Prime Minister of India Lal Bahadur
Shastri allowed that recognition to Punjabi language in
Punjab.
Prime Minister
Shastri’ sudden death in 1966 and the installation of Mrs. Indira
Gandhi as the Prime Minister led to the continuation of the
anti-Sikh discrminatory policies and programmes. A commission was
set up that took away many Punjabi speaking areas and capital city
Chandigarh away from Punjab. Even today, Punjab shares a capital
with Haryana and is the only state in the country to do so.
Despite all
these discriminotry treatment
Punjab continued
to prosper and be the richest state in
India.
To make matters worse Mrs Gandhi factionalised the Sikh polity. So,
why was Indira Gandhi so angry with the Sikhs?
As the saying
goes, Indira Gandhi wanted to teach the Sikhs a lesson. Former
Canadian High Commissioner to
India
in 1984 -William Warden testified before Justice Major at Air India
inquiry that in 1975 Indira Gandhi imposed a state of emergency in
India and the Sikh Akali party of Punjab launched one of the largest
and most effective demonstrations against what she was doing.
Finally the emergency was lifted in 1977 and she lost the next
elections. When Indira Gandhi was re-elected as PM in 1980, she was
particularly angry about the Sikh protests against her dictatorial
rule during the two years of emergency rule and was determined to
teach Sikhs a lesson. In Mr. Warden's words it was a 'pay back
time'. The western media covering Air India trial didn't give much
coverage to Mr. Warden's comments. But the points raised by Mr.
Warden are confirmed by the comments by Indian army's Lt. General
Sinha that Indian army had started preparing and practising for
attack on Golden temple 16 months before the actual attack in 1984.
The Indian
army had started preparations to teach the Sikhs a lesson at the
express wish and will of Mrs. Indira Gandhi in keeping with the
Gandhi Family Tradition. Then through a media blitzkrieg, the world
was told that Sikhs are terrorists and in the garb of that innocent
men, women and children were killed. All in the same Gandhi Family
Tradition because Indira Gandhi wanted to teach Sikhs a lesson for
opposing her emergency rule.
Then came the
illustrious son –Rajiv Gandhi. This same Gandhi family tradition to
harm the Sikh community was followed by her son Rajiv Gandhi when
thousands of innocent Sikh men, women and children were killed in
Delhi
after Indira Gandhi's assassination. Accordingly to official
statistics, 2,733 people were killed in Delhi alone.
Rajiv Gandhi
wanted to add another chapter to the tradition. He did that by
saying, “When a big tree falls, the earth shakes.” Even though 25
years have elapsed, not even a single person has been sentenced by
the Indian justice system. Even the Congress leaders found guilty by
Nanavati Commission are roaming around scot-free.
In keeping with
the Gandhi family tradition, Sonia and Rahul Gandhi have half-apologised
for the 1984 innocent killings but at the same time allowing guilty
leaders accused of innocent killings in 1984 to contest the coming
elections in India.
Another Gandhi
family tradition has always been to have a Sikh face nominated to a
high office and then give the impression to the Sikh world and the
world at large that everything is fine with the Sikhs in the
country.
In 1984 Mrs.
Gandhi elevated Giani Zail Singh as President of India. She then
used her as the Commander-in-Chief of the Indian army to order the
attack Darbar Sahib in June 1984. Even after Mrs. Gandhi's death all
foreign dignitries coming to
India were being
received by President Zail Singh or Cabinet Minister Buta Singh.
While thousands of innocent Sikhs were being killed in
Delhi
the foreign dignitaries were given the impression that Sikhs hold
powerful positions and control the government..
Now Sonia and
Rahul Gandhi has Dr. Manmohan Singh as Prime Minister. There is no
doubt that Manmohan Singh is a good, honest public adminstrator.
The power fulcrum is Sonia and Rahul Gandhi. As Prime Minister
Manmohan Singh can't even say that guilty Congress leaders like
Jagdish Tytler or Sajjan Kumar accused of 1984 killings shouldn't be
allowed to contest the coming elections in
India
as Congress leaders.
So, this is the
grand Gandhi Family Tradition –from the past to the present and with
no change expected in the future.
The author is a Surrey (Canada) based writer.
8 April 2009
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