Returning after a week's holiday, I found the media overflowing with memories of theEmergency of 25 years ago. The memory of an opportunity that the Janata leaders convertedinto failure was embarrassing.
Instead of punishing Indira Gandhi for committing treason, they legitimised her role.They helped her back to power. The bureaucracy, the judiciary, the politicians - theentire ruling class - collaborated in this exercise.
That's why all distinction between the culprits and the victims of the Emergencyblurred and finally disappeared. The victims of the Emergency helped this come about. Theyhad only themselves to blame. They lacked honour.
Consider this contradiction. George Fernandes attempted to blow up trains withdynamite, for death and destruction, in his fight against dictatorship. He was caught,arrested and charged in the Baroda Dynamite Case. But the Janata government not onlywithdrew the case against him, it made him a minister.
Why? Because in the extraordinary situation created by Indira Gandhi, Fernandes wasdeemed to be morally justified in his attempt.
Then why was Indira not punished? If someone breaks laws to seize political power byforce, it is treason. If someone breaks laws and retains power by force, that too istreason. The case was open and shut. But neither Fernandes nor Mrs Gandhi was punished.That's the magic of the Indian mind.
In the fuss, the media focused heavily on Inder Gujral. He was one of the Emergencyvictims. Indira Gandhi punished him by making him ambassador to the Soviet Union.
I feel deeply indebted to Gujral. In the Shah Commission hearings, he alone told ussomething we didn't already know. Justice Shah asked why he did not speak up during theEmergency. Gujral said: "My Lord, I am speaking with the wisdom of the hind."
He meant of course that he was speaking from hindsight. But divine intervention had ledhim to blurt out words that revealed the real truth. And he spoke for all Indianpoliticians. They all speak with the wisdom of the hind.
In other words, the Indian politician has his brains in his ass. This knowledge hashelped enormously. It clears many mysteries about why Indian politicians behave the waythey do. Mostly, their brains don't work because they are sitting on them.
Is it black, is it white?
Indians never can say!
But it is really quite all right,
We like life to be grey!
