Kuldip Nayar has returned! I’ve resorted to some cheap name-calling in the past as regards this moron (oops!) venerable journalist and I’m really feeling guilty. But lest you blame me, he returns for more. Take the present article. Before I talk about the specifics, a small sidetrack.
How could Nayar not pen an article or two especially about an issue that is close to his heart: China? The reasons, which are several, follow as you read along.
I give it to Nayar for giving us some first hand historical information (I didn’t know he was also the Home Ministry’s information officer in 1960):
Against this background, Chou En-Lai’s visit assumed a crucial importance. As the home ministry’s information officer, I was present when Chou En-lai met the then home minister, Govind Ballabh Pant, at his residence. Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru had arranged the meeting to assure the suspicious Congress that he was not seeking a compromise on the boundary dispute behind the party’s back. He had also wanted Beijing to realise how intractable were his Cabinet colleagues on the boundary question. Pant’s memory was phenomenal. He had read every bit of material on the dispute. Starting from the Ladakh side and ending with the Thag La Ridge, Pant tried to establish the watershed theory - the point from which water flowed to either side should be taken as the dividing line. Where the line was straight, he argued, it would follow the crest of the high dividing range (Beijing had agreed by implication to the watershed theory while signing border treaties with Myanmar and Nepal).
After subjecting us to some pretty lengthy historical background, Nayar presents his first dramatic flush.
(The then defence minister, Krishna Menon, who was not present at the meeting, conveyed to Nehru the impression that Pant was rude to Chou En-lai)
Two villains and an act of justification: actually, one villain and a liar. G.B. Pant the villain, for allegedly having been rude to Chou, and V.K.K. Menon the liar, for alleging the rudeness.
I don’t know much about Pant’s “rudeness” so we’ll let that go. Even if he was “rude” to Chou (ok, it’s bad manners to treat a guest discourteously and all that), was that sufficient reason China chose to attack India? So here we have, Exhibit 1 of Nayar’s senility.
As for V.K.K. Menon, it is again a sad commentary of the Golden Nehruvian Era of Suppression. Krishna Menon whatever his faults, was along with Nehru’s Man Friday, his scapegoat. As spotlessly as Nehru wore his attire–complete with the fresh red rose–he strove to create an impression that his character was likewise, flawless. And he did succeed in it with elan. Evidence: the all-seasons Nehru apologetic, Kuldip Nayar; and a whole generation of Nehru fanatics starting from Kushwant Singh right up to Shashi Tharoor, who has a rather pompous title for his recent book, Nehru, the Invention of India. As long as he could help it, Nehru suppressed any reference to his misdeeds and muffled all opposition (all right, he was not as bad as his daughter but on hindsight the Stalinist streak only showed up prominently in Indira).
It was in this communist socialist era that Sita Ram Goel wrote a series of articles that exposed Nehru for what he was: a true blood communist. This was later compiled and published as a book, which I’ve reviewed here. This book was originally, ironically titled, In Defence of Comrade Krishna Menon. Because Menon was a faithful communist and Sita Ram Goel who fought against communism wrote scathingly against everybody including Mao and Stalin. While researching this book, Goel discovered that it was actually Nehru who pulled the strings and Menon was merely the proverbial lamb.
And this conclusion holds true even today when you read Nehru apologetics trying to still whitewash his sins. In this case, Nayar making the snide remark–in braces–about Pant’s rudeness reported by Krishna Menon. Or the other secularism-personified news anchor cum columnist, Rajdeep Sardesai who writes,
This was the glorious Nehruvian era, where the towering presence of Jawaharlal appeared to dwarf every other public figure. Nehru, as his biographers of the period have noted, was someone blessed with an almost royal touch in the eyes of the common man. [.] Nehru – despite the taint of dismissing an elected government in Kerala – was ultimately a democrat down to his last bone.
Continues Nayar,
Some can reassess Nehru’s approach to China. I think he tried his best to be accommodative and even offered the Aksai-Chin in a roundabout manner…
Significant. The word accommodative, is a euphemism for what characterised Nehru: cowardice and foolish idealism in foreign policy. Nehru like Vajpayee was smitten with an overwhelming desire to be the “messiah of peace” in international politics. That, and the fact that he was enamoured with Communism contributed to the Himalayan Blunder (thanks, Major Dalvi for the apt title). When several small and large groups protested on the streets of Delhi cautioning the government about the Chinese designs, Nehru fumed and threatened that “this kind of behaviour will not be tolerated” (from Sita Ram Goel’s book). His silent acquiescence on the Chinese incursion in Tibet only made them bolder. In fact, I dare say that Nehru only invited the Chinese to invade Indian territory while Nehru apologetics continue to uphold the pretence that Nehru was not at fault by trying to find newer excuses to support their claims.
Chou En-lai was angry that Nehru had given asylum to the Dalai Lama in 1959. But New Delhi could not have shut its doors to a person who was considered “holy” by most people in India. China’s objective, it appears, was to heighten tension in the world and to make non-alignment and peaceful existence more or less difficult to maintain.
Kuldip Nayar should understand that apart from the closed corridors of the JNU and in assorted circles, Nehru today is an object of contempt.
Update: The Acorn has a pithy post on the same op-ed!
Tags: Commentary, History, Indian Politics, Pseudo Secularism Hall of Shame, War on Communism
I’m no defender of Kuldip Nayyar, but you have not sufficiently justified your criticism of Nayyar.
Regarding “example 1″ that you have pointed out, Nayyar does not ever mention that it was G.B.Pant’s rudeness that caused China to attack. He states that Menon reported to Nehru that Pant was rude. It, it appears, is more intended to give a sense of the internal bickerings of the cabinet than provide a justification for China’s attack.
Again, your last paragraph is unrelated to the quote that you make above it. You have not rejected Nayyar’s arguments about asylum to the Dalai Lama, but made an (apparently) unrelated, but not necessarily untrue, statement about Nehru’s image today.
>>Regarding “example 1″ that you have pointed out, Nayyar does not ever mention that it was G.B.Pant’s rudeness that caused China to attack.
Suren, read my post carefully again. I never said that Pant’s rudeness caused China to attack. I merely wanted to show that this kind of finding-the-scapegoat (which Nayar has done by taking VKK Menon’s name) style of writing isn’t quite right. Tell me, how does Nayar’s mentioning of Menon’s name throw additional light on what he wants to say?
>>Again, your last paragraph is unrelated to the quote that you make above it. You have not rejected Nayyar’s arguments about asylum to the Dalai Lama,
You’re mistaken again, Suren. The quote before the last paragraph should be read in conjunction to the paragraph that appears before the quote. If you notice the title of this post, I’ve said “return of the Nehru-apologetic.” Which is what Nayar has done in his article: whitewashing Nehru’s sins. And it wasn’t my intent to examine Nayar’s argument about Dalai Lama. Nehru has done a lot of misdeeds and it requires a separate book/website to examine all of them.
Dear Sandeep,
Here is something for you from DILIP D’SOUZA
http://dcubed.blogspot.com/2005/04/rashomon-on-border.html
Rashomon on the border
Some days ago, there was a long exchange of fire between forces on the Bangladesh-India border. Left dead were Indian Border Security Force commander Jeevan Kumar and Bangladeshi schoolgirl Nahida Akhtar.
How do you react to this news?
Well, for one thing, where’s the news coming from? And then, are you Indian or Bangladeshi? How you react, it seems, must depend on your answers to those two questions.
The Bangladeshi reports? An Indian man crossed the border carrying several bottles of phensidyl, a cough syrup that is illegal in that country. After Bangladeshi forces “arrested” him, 100 BSF men from India “launched violent attacks” on civilian houses in the area and “looted cash, gold ornaments and other valuables.” Hearing about this, Bangladesh Rifles (BDR) forces “rushed” there and tried to stop this assault. Upon which, “witnesses said” the BSF “opened fire on the BDR without any provocation.” The BDR returned fire “in self-defense.”
And the Indian reports? “Armed Bangladeshi villagers” started “taking away” an Indian national. When the BSF tried to stop this, BDR forces “opened fire on the BSF party without any provocation whatsoever.” Though the BSF men stopped firing, “the BDR personnel continued firing.” The BDR has links with “smuggler mafias”, and they targeted Jeevan Kumar because he “checked smuggling in this sector.” There are even reports that Kumar was tortured. Besides the two deaths, two other jawans were among four people who were injured in the exchange.
How do you make sense of these utterly different accounts of the same incident? (No links: if you want them, they are not difficult to find).
To start, you could look more closely at both reports, ask questions, find holes.
For example, you might ask who these armed villagers were. What were they doing there? Then again, their presence is reported only in Indian reports. Were they really there and really armed?
You might ask why the BSF killed an innocent schoolgirl. Then again, she was 1.5 km away from the firing. Did a stray bullet really travel that far with that deadly effect?
You might wonder who started the firing, because both sides claim that the other did and both use the identical formulation “without any provocation.” You might puzzle over why villagers, armed or not, would take away an Indian. You might think it is absurd to believe that BSF men suddenly attack and loot houses. You might say that a smuggler of illegal drugs must be arrested and punished. Even if it was merely cough syrup.
All that, yet I wager that what you believe and which course resonates depends on whether you’re Indian or Bangladeshi.
So I know Indians, outraged by this incident, who are calling for a strong military response against Bangladesh. They rail against the pusillanimity of a country that would be pushed around by a minnow like Bangladesh. Even if there was provocation, they say, Bangladesh cannot do this to an Indian soldier. That country seems to think it is India’s equal, and our response should be so overwhelming as to rid them of such grandiose pretensions.
I know Bangladeshis, every bit as outraged, who point to this incident as more evidence of Indian bullying. Over the last five years, they say, the BSF has killed almost 400 innocent Bangladeshis for no reason: one every five days. To go with that toll, there are reports of rapes and assorted other harrassment by the BSF. Indians pay no attention to all this, which annoys Bangladeshis even more.
And I’m left to wonder, why is it that the way we consider incidents like this must be coloured by our national loyalties? Why must we believe our own country’s version of events, even if it has holes, over the other’s? (Then again, the other country’s version also has holes).
Is it so hard to accept that when you have a tense border, you’re going to have incidents like this one, and that’s really why it happened? That if we want no more futile deaths like these, the real answer is for both countries to learn to live like neighbours, which they never have managed?
Whatever our patriotic impulses, the reality is that two families were shattered that day. Should a line on a map colour sorrow over those two tragedies as well?
PLEASE RESPOND TO IT.
Thanks, Vishnu
Hi Vishnu
I’ve read that piece, and yawwwwnnnn, it doesn’t merit a response. Moreover, unless I’m wrong, The Acorn has already responded to it in one of his entries. Check his blog at http://opinion.paifamily.com.