How time flies! I don’t know what sort of calender you use up there, but eight arduous years have passed in this cursed planet since you were scattered by an inhuman bomb on this very day. You left us in a jiffy, but your memory, your legacy and your family too, haunt us today like never before.
Your benign smile, disarming manners and youthful charm are ever etched in our minds and evoke painful pangs of anguish whenever that fateful day dawns and even otherwise. Your legacy-not the political one which today is in a state of flux- but the one you really stood for-dreams of a very modern, strong India, however still remains where you left it, always reminding us how things would have been if you were at the helm. And your Family, well…there seems to be a problem there, Rajiv,… I will come to that later.
I am not sure if you know it, not that it matters to you anymore, but seven, and only seven, six men and a woman, have been indicted for shredding you. The list contained 26 names originally, but nineteen of them were spared the noose as it turned out that they were really your fans.
Or so it is said. In fact, eminent men of law andletters have also declared that your assassination was not even an act of terrorism, but a simple case of murder committed by a few characters who harboured a ‘personal’ enmity towards you. We, ignoramuses, had concluded that you were killed because as head of State you did things which were not to the liking of the nation’s enemies and therefore you were a martyr. We still think so because we laymen are not as intelligent as lawmen.
Of course, you must now be watching all the fun from above though I doubt whether you will be really humoured at this parade of hysteria being enacted by your political legacy. I always felt you were an extremely shy person and that you felt embarrassed whenever overzealous partymen threw themselves on you in a fit of feigned reverence.
Not that you never deserved or enjoyed real respect and affection, but you had a way of acknowledging it, by not making it a public spectacle just for the heck of ascertaining your greatness, as most leaders today do. Sure there were some cronies of yours who behaved as if they owned you and, you in all faith and decency allowed them quite a leeway in government and personal life, but after the 1989 debacle you indeed woke up to the doom inflicted by the Doon mates.
The Rajiv, on the comeback trail in 1991, was a more mature, circumspect and mellowed person while yet retaining his eternal charm and modern outlook. Looking back, yes Rajiv, you would have made a difference had you not been snatched away.
To be sure, your partymen and some of your old mates too, have not changed since and no one expects them to too, as obeisance is ingrained in their genes, whoever the leader, and more so if the person is from your family. But the apprehension that has crept in is that your dear wife might have fallen for the irresistible bait, that the power hungry Congmen lay out so adeptly to any gullible member of your family.
It is a surprise, Rajiv, because we know that Sonia implored you not to court politics as she knew that you could not do it as perfectly as you courted her. Also, she apprehended a threat to your life, which became a sad reality too.
But we are at a loss to know what happened after seven long years had passed. Your children, we hear, have now put themselves in Sonia’s position and are telling her not to yield to the pressure tactics of the partymen, but we are not sure if good sense will prevail, for two reasons. One, the persistent Congressmen are wonderful salesmen of power dreams and are eminently capable of camouflaging their real ambitions under a canopy of sycophancy and unswerving loyalty.
They have been very successful so far. Secondly, Sonia herself seems to entertain mega hopes of becoming the PM which fact was very evident during her aborted bid to grab power through the back door, something you shunned in similar circumstances in 1991.
I am sorry to say this to such a wonderful gentleman like you, but I hope you will understand because you have always been a patient listener. Leave alone legitimacy, is it prudent at all for your wife to make a bid for power just on the pretext of saving the hallowed Congress?
Is it not time for the party to learn to live on its own and fend for itself without props from your family that has already shed enough blood for the party and the nation? Will not the supreme sacrifices of your family be more cherished if they are confined to the history books and are not allowed to spill over to the murky pages of present day politics?
Should the nation remember you as a person who imposed a very alien wife on the country as its leader, though we all know that you never did and never would have wished it? Should your name and legacy be tarnished for no fault of yours, which is what will happen because once in the fray, Rajiv’s wife too is just another political animal along with the multitudes that already infest the arena? With the added disadvantage of inviting an avoidable debate on the family’s entire history and its activities which is inevitable in a no-holds-barred war?
Does she really believe that she would be allowed to function freely and without aspersions being cast on her foreign origin, even assuming she is committed to the country as is being claimed? Let alone political enemies, would the senior Congressmen who have put in decades of ‘service’ in the party, really take kindly to her presence in a position of power?
Do you really think that the present triumvirate are the only dissenters in the party? What if several others who shared similar views had chosen to wait for a better day, for various reasons including the fear of getting lynched by the furious Congmen? I am sure you witnessed all that display of mobocracy, when the CWC was literally bullied into expelling the trio. Who would now dare to challenge those hysterical gangs stalking the streets of the Capital? But does such snuffing out of legitimate dissent ensure a smooth reign for Sonia?
You know better, Rajiv, because you had an uncomfortable existence with faceless party big brothers breathing down your neck.
Such tight-rope walking is getting increasingly difficult, because the people too have evolved and are watching keenly.
I hope that on this day, when the entire nation including your family comes to you to pay homage, you will tell them all to see sense.
Yours affectionately,
An Indian
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