Farthest Field

Title: Farthest Field – An Indian Story of the Second World War

Author: Raghu Karnad

Publisher: Fourth Estate, 2015 (First)

ISBN: 9789351772033

Pages: 300

India takes pride in the fact that it never used its resources for colonization of others. Indians never invaded others. Its export was in the realm of trade and ideas. Inured to these lofty self-congratulatory ideas, most of us would be astonished to learn that the Indian army performed a more than merely active participation in the two world wars. The mercenary army fought for the British, their colonial masters. It fought on three continents – Asia, Europe and Africa – valiantly. Its contests were against Britain’s enemies, which included suppression of popular unrest against colonial occupation in other countries. Though herself subservient to the British, India’s soldiers fought to wipe out opposition to their masters in India as elsewhere. The unsavouriness of this episode must be the reason why the Indian army’s exploits in the pre-independence era is not eulogized about. Raghu Karnad, a young award-winning writer and journalist, steps forward to rectify this deficiency in India’s history books. Taking his grandfather and his two brothers-in-law for study, who had lost their lives in the Second World War, Karnad tells the story of how the Indian army sacrificed all it held dear on the altar of loyalty to the British. The Hindu-Parsi household of the author brings to light the cosmopolitan character of the fighting force. The author argues that every man has two deaths. One is his physical death when he ceases to exist in the material sense. The other death occurs when people who remember him themselves pass away, resulting in total obliteration of the man’s memories. This is the farthest field beyond which posterity loses all track of the dead ones. Karnad presents the story of his grandfather and granduncles in an effort to extend the farthest field by a bit more, by telling a long forgotten story to the newest generation of India.

Britain subjugated India with money borrowed from the conquered and with soldiers recruited from the vanquished. The Indian troops transformed into a solid bulwark on which the empire’s edifice rested. Punjabi and Gurkha troops helped suppress the Mutiny in 1857. They, and other Indian regiments provided the British with awesome firepower in the Great War of 1914 on fields as far away as Gallipoli and Mesopotamia. Even in India, they could be trusted to crush native protests against the colonizers. Reginald Dyer led a barrage of bullets on the defenseless assembly at Jallianwala Bagh with the aid of 65 Gurkha and 25 Baluchi soldiers. Employment in the British Indian army was like serving in the fifth column against one’s own compatriots. But what did they get in return? Apart from job security and a low but steady income, they had to undergo discrimination of the worst kind as mentioned in this book. For a very long time, Indians were not allowed entry in the officer cadre. Even while faithfully serving the British Queen in the First World War, some compunction was audible about the propriety of using black Indian troops to kill fellow white Germans. Indians were denied electricity in the barracks. British soldiers equal in rank with Indians gathered higher pay packets as they were entitled to lavish allowances for serving away from home. When the army was evacuated in a hurry from Malaya and Burma, when the Japanese overwhelmed them, Whites obtained privileges denied to the native soldiers. This practice of leaving Indians to their fate as the enemy approached put paid to the claim of benevolence of the British Raj. Even the dark skinned offspring of Anglo-Indian unions were denied entry to the vehicles reserved for the Whites. British administrators were hesitant to arm Indians with sophisticated weaponry. Churchill openly fretted at the thought of creating a Frankenstein by equipping Indian soldiers with modern weapons. On the other hand, a job in the army relieved the man and his family from the clutches of starvation. New recruits gained as much as a fifth of their bodyweight in the first few months of enrolment.

Colourful accounts of the Indian Army’s battles in Eritrea, Egypt, Libya and Iraq are given in the book, mostly reconstructed from regimental diaries, added with a pinch of the author’s rich imagination and insightful choice of words. What is really noteworthy is that the thread of the three brothers-in-law of Mogaseth family is kept unbroken. Though all of them laid down their lives while on call of duty, which forms the raison d’être of the book, their unfortunate ends are narrated in a dispassionate way that is matter of fact. It details the dreams of the young men as they were being educated and how they were sucked up into the infernal belly of the war machine.

In any sense of the word, the Second World War had been a pivotal point in India’s march to independence and her economic sustainability in modern commerce. Indian soldiers performed excellently well in all theaters of war they were deployed in, always in the face of heavy odds stacked against them. The compulsions of wartime needs forced Britain to build up the Indian army with modern weapons and with a native command structure. This was in stark contrast with age-old practice in which British officers commanded native soldiers. The middle-class entered the army as officers, having cut their teeth in nationalist struggles in colleges. Britain could no longer count on the loyalty of their own officers in a future confrontation with the natives on issues of self-rule. Besides, the war gifted a bonanza to India’s industry and economy. The wealth of major industrialists like Birla grew six-fold during the war. India’s debt to Britain was entirely paid off against wartime purchases, and the country stood at a sterling surplus of one million pounds.

The Congress party, which had ruled the country for most of its post-independence period, has cultivated a myth of the essentiality of the party in India’s struggle for independence. Even though the party had led only three popular agitations – civil disobedience, non-cooperation and Quit India – cleverly doctored history textbooks convey the outrageous idea that they alone have been instrumental in snatching freedom from Britain. This book provides several examples negating this assertion. The Quit India movement fizzled completely out within three months of its inception, leaving the field free for the machinations of the Muslim League. Karnad chides the Congress that they had never done anything more than tug at the tablecloth of the Empire and rattle its silver!

The book is a delight to read. Helpful maps are included as well as a moderately sized section on Notes. Select bibliography is a part of the book. A neat index adds real value to the content. The author’s reconstruction of the events from scant resources command appreciation, in addition to ensuring him a deserved place in the gallery of capable young writers of fact and fiction.

The book is recommended.

Rating: 3 Star

The Hall of a Thousand Columns

Title: The Hall of a Thousand Columns

Author: Tim Mackintosh-Smith

Publisher: John Murray, 2006 (First published 2005)

ISBN: 9780719565878

Pages: 333

Making history was a favourite pastime of Indian rulers, but writing it was never even a hobby. As the Hindu rulers fell one by one against the invading Islamic might, things changed. Muslim nobles and courtiers produced journals and panegyrics of their patrons. This was a period in which travelers through the land recorded their observations. Ibn Battutah (1304 – 69) was a noted Moroccan religious scholar and world traveler, who visited India during the reign of Muhammed Shah Tughluq and stayed in the country for eight years beginning in 1333. He was made a religious judge by Tughluq, but soon lost his favour. When at last he regained it, the assignment was to serve as ambassador to the Chinese emperor’s court. He travelled from Delhi, via Aligarh to the Gujarat coast. He covered the western coast in a flotilla and reached Calicut. Not content with the idea of staying put in a port town, he sailed the entire Kerala coast up and down. Back in Calicut again, his ships and the sovereign’s gifts to China were lost in a storm from which ibn Battutah escaped as he was attending Friday prayers in a mosque on the shore. Afraid to go back to Delhi, he did some island hopping and visited China and Indonesia eventually.

Tim Mackintosh-Smith is a British author who has settled in Yemen. He is a well known writer, traveler and lecturer. In this book, he retraces the footsteps of ibn Battutah, whose name he shortens to IB, which adds intimacy for the medieval traveler on the readers’ minds. He is accompanied by Martin Yeoman, illustrator of the book, who is also a painter, draughtsman, sculptor and etcher. The duo virtually lives in the Indian countryside, assimilating personal interactions with local scholars. He finds ready acceptance among Islamic scholars with his mastery of the Arabic language and literature. The title of the book is derived from the exaggerated description of Muhammed Shah Tuguluq’s famed audience chamber, in which he received the traveler.

Ibn Battutah spent several years of his Indian sojourn at the court of Muhammed ibn Tughluq, called zalim (the tyrant) by his hapless subjects. The author lets out IB’s narration only selectively, but whatever is available paints a scary picture of the tyrant. Religious scholars commanded respect from all, but even they were not immune from the whims and fury of the ruler. We read about a Muslim saint who disobeyed Tughluq forcibly fed excrement for hours and then beheaded. When he transferred the capital from Delhi to Daulatabad in Deccan, a few chose not to go there. They were inflicted with model punishment. One was blown from the mouth of a cannon and a blind man was dragged by horse to the new capital city. When it arrived there 40 days later, only a part of the leg by which the poor guy was secured to the horse remained in place. Such was the cruelty of this sultan, which was excessive even by medieval standards. Slavery was widespread in the sultanate with the full sanction of religion. The price of a pre-pubescent slave girl quoted in the book is about half of a goat and about a quarter of a cow. Conquests in the country ensured a continuous supply of men and women in the ranks of slaves with the additional burden of sexual servitude on the latter. The author identifies the genre of tyrants like Muhammed Shah by the sheer force with which the throne was held up and he was no different in caliber than Ahmed Shah Masoud, the former warlord of Afghanistan. Muhammed Shah distrusted Muslims of Indian origin and filled the nobility with people invited from all across the Islamic world. That was the reason why the traveler ibn Battutah was appointed as the religious judge of the Maliki sect. Nobles from the entire Islamic world flocked to Delhi like moths to a candle.

The author travels through Muslim India. He is in search of places built by sultans, their graves and other memorabilia. In this sense, a similarity may be established with William Dalrymple’s works. The occupations, concerns and worries of the Indian Muslim community are expressed by the people the travelers meet on the way. Irfan Habeeb, the noted Islamist historian of Aligarh Muslim University suggests that central rule had failed in India ages ago as it still does. In this era of demanding more decentralization and devolution of powers, the historian’s remark is way off the mark. The author is surprised at the fact that many inmates of the Aligarh University cheer the Australians in a cricket match against India! The reason for doing so was that the fascists would take over in case India wins! Even die hard religious fanatics masquerade as leftists in this university. Mackintosh-Smith returns the grooming he received there with the remark that ‘he could see why the staff of Aligarh, most of whom Muslims, all of whom have brains, were worried by the BJP and its saffron flag’. But this stark separation and victimization claimed by the Muslim elite is not visible in the villages. There, the Hindus routinely visit Islamic holy places and revere sufis and pirs as they do sanyasis. The Muslim conjurors depicted in another part of the book use the image of Kali to pay respects.

Mackintosh-Smith’s visit to the South coincided with the Godhra riots of 2002, which might be one reason why he was denied permission to visit Anjidiv near Goa, which IB had visited and met a mysterious yogi, but the place was since taken over by the Indian navy to construct a naval base. Though the conclusions reached by the author upon visiting places or meeting descendants of the people mentioned by IB may seem farfetched, it is pleasurable for readers to enjoy the supposed charm of finding a thread unbroken in the past seven centuries or so. Everywhere he visits, the author is reminded of the syncretism of the land’s assimilating spirit. He comments that ‘India as a whole had a habit of sliding in and out of that borderland between faith and faith, creed and conjury’.

The book is, however, not easy to read. Mackintosh-Smith had used a little too much eloquence for a work of this kind. His adroitness in finding synonyms in its multitudes baffles the readers as does his penchant for using colloquial terms liberally. The work’s overarching sense of humour is sometimes eclipsed by this play of words. The author’s observation is sharp and noteworthy. He describes Malabar (Kerala) as a vast inhabited garden and expresses rage at the Portuguese for destroying the maritime prosperity of the land. Regarding sati, the age-old Indian custom of widow burning, he remarks that ‘it was a custom religiously followed by a few, toed halfheartedly by rather more, sidestepped by many and ignored by most’. The book is adorned with hand sketches by Martin Yeoman and sports a fine index, but curiously, no Notes.

The book is recommended.

Rating: 3 Star

The Longest August

Title: The Longest August – The Unflinching Rivalry between India and Pakistan

Author: Dilip Hiro

Publisher: Nation Books, 2015 (First)

ISBN: 9781568585154

Pages: 503

When the British gave independence to India, it came at an excruciating price. The country was divided into two, in the name of religion and a bloody transfer of population between the countries. The British acceded to the demand of the Muslim League, acting as the voice of Indian Muslims. The Congress party opposed it at first, but it was fairly obvious to impartial observers to discern the strong justification for the cry for partition of the country – that the Hindus and Muslims are two nations. If we take a glance at the violent history of the subcontinent of the last 1200 years, it may be seen that the Muslims who mattered most came here by invasion and/or forced conversion. For 1000 years, their descendants subjugated the country until effectively challenged by the Rajputs and Marathas in the 18^th century CE. But before they could achieve anything substantial, the British came along, conquering all the warring parties. 150 years under colonial rule taught the country to look at the wider world without the crippling restrictions imposed by religion. As it was evident that the country would be left with a democratic form of government based on universal adult franchise when the British leave for good, a section of the Muslims were worried at the prospect of the country being ruled by Hindus, who commanded a majority in numbers. For the most part, Indian Muslims never lived under Hindu rule in history. Perhaps if the Marathas had had a little more leeway in the 18^th century, or if the British had came on the scene a hundred years later, Indian Muslims would have learned how to live peacefully and prosperously under a Hindu ruler. As it was, their apprehensions were understandable and the demands found acceptance by the colonial regime, who carved Pakistan out of India. Dilip Hiro, who had himself emigrated out of Pakistan after partition tells the story of the unflinching rivalry between the sister nations and the exacting toll it had claimed from both sides in term of men, money and resources, to say nothing about missed opportunities. The book essentially covers the period from 1900 to 2013.

It is an unwritten dictum in children’s comics that superheroes don’t fight each other. Who has seen Mandrake the Magician plotting against Phantom, or Spiderman? But in politics, when there is not enough maneuvering room for two tall leaders, tussle is bound to ensue. A classic example is illustrated in the first few chapters of the book, in the form of the cold war between Gandhi and Jinnah, Fathers of the Nation, respectively of India and Pakistan. The estrangement began right when Gandhi returned to India after his two decades long stint in South Africa. Jinnah was comfortable only with English, which he termed the only language in which he was sure not to make any mistakes. When he began a salutary speech for Gandhi in the reception organized in Bombay, he felt chided by Gandhi’s stickler for using Gujarati (the mother tongue of both) in the function. Jinnah abhorred Gandhi’s schemes for mass participation in his political programs. He was staunch supporter of legal procedures and for meetings behind closed doors to wrest more power for Indians. Even though the Muslim League was formed way back in 1906, its meetings were planned near to the dates of Congress meetings and in the same city, since Muslims were members of both organizations. When World War I ended, the Turkish sultan stood defeated, as he sided with the losing party in the war. He saw dismemberment of his empire which included the holiest sites of Islam. As he was also the caliph of Muslims worldwide, Indian Mussulmans were angered at the cavalier way in which this spiritual master was being treated by the British. Radicalization began in consequence to it, but Gandhi sided with Ali brothers in proceeding with Khilafat agitation to recuperate the king of Turkey. This had absolutely no political significance to India, which was then reeling in the aftermath of the Jalianwala Bagh Massacre, and was a clear case of mixing religion with politics to garner popular support. Jinnah opposed this move, but Gandhi was determined to use the communal plank. This set alight religious passion in copious quantities so as to spill over into many orgies of communal riots. As the Hindu and Muslim communities separated more and more in thinking, Jinnah changed his stance and sided with his own coreligionists. Here, one question faces us directly in the eye. If there was reconciliation between the two leaders and Jinnah remained secular and in Congress, would the idea of Pakistan ever have arisen? The answer would be an emphatic yes. Had Jinnah stayed back, he would have grown in stature like another Maulana Abul Kalam Azad – a leader to show off, but inconsequential. The predominantly Hindu Congress would not have allowed a Muslim to obtain absolute control over it. The separation of the two communities was a historical inevitability and if Jinnah was not in the picture, another Muslim leader would have donned that mantle. Hiro also mentions Gandhi’s dubious experiments involving his grand niece to attain moral merit by his abstinence from sexual desire which is to be helpful in his fight against Jinnah.

A contrasting picture of Jawaharlal Nehru against his image of a great scholarly national leader is painted by Hiro. Various instances are enumerated in the book that extols the fallacy of many acts perpetrated by India’s first prime minister. Nehru referred the Kashmir issue to the UN in response to Pakistan’s deploying its irregular troops into Kashmir and annexing a part of it. UN suggested a plebiscite which is the constant refrain on the part of Pakistan ever since. India strongly opposed any attempt to internationalize the issue, but it is highly embarrassing to it that the first move on this front was initiated by Nehru under the advice from Lord Mount Batten, India’s first governor general. Nehru maintained a haughty demeanour against other world leaders not matching him in their education, aristocratic background or scholarship. Ayub Khan, Pakistan’s military dictator, complained in private that Nehru look upon him with contempt. Nehru’s debacle against China resulted in loss of prestige for India in its disastrous war against its northern neighbour in 1962. The fuse is to said to have been lit by Nehru claiming the sanctity of the border between India and China as demarcated by McMahon as inviolable. China maintained that it had not ratified the border as did the existing maps. However, Nehru instructed that the boundary be made permanent and set up army posts in the disputed territory. This led to skirmishes which grew in intensity as both sides stuck to its guns. When Nehru ordered Indian troops to assault Chinese soldiers perceived to be crossing the border, China invaded on a large scale. Indian troops were unequal to meet the aggression. After imposing a humiliating defeat, the Chinese declared a unilateral ceasefire and returned to pre-war positions on the eastern front and Arunachal Pradesh, but not in Ladakh. Nehru’s boastful speeches on non-alignment with superpowers antagonized America right from the start, but during the Chinese incursion into the country, Nehru swallowed his pride and unashamedly begged US to provide military aid and equipment. Hiro also comments that India trained and deployed Tibetans to rebel against China, which irritated them greatly. However, he does not say a word against China’s forcible annexation of Tibet. Going by the author’s narrative, one gets the feel that Tibet had always remained a part of China and that India fomented trouble in a peaceful province of a neighbouring country.

Handling of history of the last three decades lacks sufficient depth, partly due to the fact that no epochal event such as a full scale war had materialized between the two countries. The narration falls to the level of a journal after the year 2000, expounding summit meetings and bilateral negotiations. It may be news to many people on both sides of the border to learn that the two countries had come to the brink of nuclear war in retaliation of the terrorist attack on Kaluchak army base in 2002. There is another reason for the lull in mutual engagement. As the economic clout of India grew, the disparity in GDP of the two countries widened.

Hiro includes an informative chapter on soft power exerted by India in both Afghanistan and Pakistan. Afghanistan is a factor to contend with, in any discussion on South Asia, as both India and Pakistan try to woo them in their proxy war against the other. India’s soft power is visible in the field of television and cinema. Dramatized Hindi serials are having wide viewership in both its western neighbours. Indian films have surpassed the appeal of movies made in Pakistan. However, in a clear indication that both countries are deeply permeated by the bigotry of sectarian religious views, scenes depicting Hindu idols or offering pujas are masked out in public screenings. It is no wonder then, to deduce the unseen channel fertilizing Jihadism and its export around the world. In the same token, it may be realized that the strong attraction of Bollywood movies in Pakistan is helped in no small measure by the monopoly of the three Khans in its actor list and the efforts of the Mumbai underworld to keep it so.

The author asserts many facts in his narrative, but the sources are not strong enough to guarantee its veracity. In a few cases, he opts for sensationalism with no strong card in hand. For example, he avers that Vajpayee, India’s prime minister from 1998 to 2004 was unmarried, but not celibate! How on earth can he substantiate this allegation in a meaningful way? Every author writing on such topics would love to have a bit of controversy to boost the publicity and sale of the book. The unnecessary tirade – whether true or not – on Vajpayee may be seen in that light. However, this remark didn’t provoke a controversy in India. Hiro takes special pleasure in belittling the stature of Indian leaders while being extra careful not to say anything about the personal lives of Pakistani leaders.

The book is eminently readable and highly recommended.

Rating: 3 Star

The Death & Afterlife of Mahatma Gandhi

Title: The Death & Afterlife of Mahatma Gandhi

Author: Makarand R. Paranjape

Publisher: Random House India, 2015 (First published 2014)

ISBN: 9788184006803

Pages: 331

Mahatma Gandhi is the Father of the Nation. India never came across an abler leader than him in its long career. Without taking up arms, or raising his voice, or spilling British blood, he made the empire in which the sun never set see their folly and leave the country to its original inhabitants, but with Partition. Even today, Indians have not fully come to terms with the Muslim League’s premise that Hindus and Muslims are two separate nations. Reviewing the post-independence history and observing the enormous chasm which separates the two countries’ political and social mores, one might wonder whether the League’s contention was indeed true. A country where Islamic law prevails is bound to be narrow-minded, bigoted and the minorities are accorded secondary status. Gandhi himself had to acknowledge this in an indirect way. When his program for Hindu-Muslim unity failed, he opted for amity, instead. When that too didn’t bear fruit, he settled for peaceful coexistence. Being a staunch devotee of god himself, Gandhi exhorted that religion should be uniting, rather than divisive. The bloody violence that followed Partition stunned the leaders. Gandhi’s efforts to stop the violence succeeded in India, while it continued unabated across the border. Moreover, he forced the hand of the Indian government to release Rs. 55 crores (nearly $ 1.2 billion in today’s money), which was withheld in the wake of Pakistan’s invasion of Kashmir. This act of apparent treason prompted a few Hindu fanatics under the leadership of Nathuram Godse and Narayan Apte to conspire to assassinate Gandhi. This heinous act was consummated on January 30, 1948. This book is an attempt to re-read Gandhi’s life and message, but also the idea of India by inquiring into the meaning of his death. Makarand R. Paranjape is a critic, poet, novelist and public intellectual. He has authored many books.

Gandhi’s ideals overwhelmed the domain of the political to flow into the spiritual realm as well. India reveres saints and ascetics, making its people somewhat naïve not to see through the plots of charlatans in the guise of religion. But Gandhi rightfully earned his place among the saints whom the people adore. His last words, ‘Hey Ram’, provided the icing on the cake, as a man who is devoted to the lord even in death. But, did he really utter those words? We have two testimonies in this book which are, however, contradictory. Godse testified that Gandhi uttered only a guttural cry of pain on being shot. Manubehn, on whose shoulders Gandhi was leaning while walking to the prayer podium clearly stated that he indeed whisper ‘Hey Ram’ while falling to the ground. Paranjape challenges Godse’s claim with the argument that the very loud shot of the pistol must have temporarily deafened the assailant and he might not have heard a thing of what the Mahatma said. But this point is applicable equally in the case of Manubehn as well, as three bullets were shot in quick succession in point blank range. In fact, the author himself quotes her as saying that “the bullets had been fired so near me, that for a while, my ears were deaf and I could not hear a thing” (p.15). How then could she lucidly hear the faint voice of the dying Mahatma? ’Hey Ram’ appears to be a clever stratagem in the posthumous beatification process of Gandhi, particularly when we know that he had publicly wished in many prayer meetings that “if somebody shot at me and I received his bullet on my bare chest, without a sigh and with Rama’s name on my lips, only then you should say that I was a true Mahatma” (p.109). This ironic comment made two days before the assassination might have been painful for those who loved him.

Most of the ideas and arguments Paranjape puts forward in the first half of this book is superfluous and pretentious. Godse’s motive in killing Gandhi is said to be the desire to bring about a Hindu Rashtra (nation) in India. But the removal of the father of the nation from the political scene in fact helped Nehru, who was a diehard secularist of leftist leaning, to acquire absolute power within the party and government. The assassination unsettled thinkers in a profound way as we see a comment in the book, reportedly made by Ashis Nandy, that the community of Chitpavan Brahmins, to which Godse belonged, should be targeted for the crime! The martyrdom of Gandhi has been so shocking to the national psyche which was not at all familiar with an act of patricide in its mythology, rich and varied thought it was. Consequently, it is referred to as a sacrifice or martyrdom, without referring to it straightforward as a murder. Assassination put a spell of ritual pollution on the country and we have been eulogizing his death than addressing the implications of his brutal murder.

Paranjape is a voracious reader and his familiarity with western conceptions of guilt and accountability related to the domain of psychoanalysis prompts him to churn out outlandish theories. Gandhi was the Father of the Nation. So when an Indian killed him, it must be an act of patricide. There are no instances of patricide in Indian mythology, but there is a convenient similar case in Greek mythology, that of Oedipus Rex who killed his father and wedded his mother, without knowing them to be his parents. Hence, what Godse did was a case of Oedipus complex and the author gets into a lengthy and dry hairsplitting analysis of two irrelevant theses put forward by Western thinkers like Girard, Deleuze and Guattari, Eugene W. Holland and others. A detailed review of the Bollywood film ‘Lage Raho Munnabhai’ is also given as if to prove the contemporary relevance of the Mahatma. Unrelated information like Godse’s alleged homosexuality is mentioned as if to place the last nail on his coffin.

The second part of the book on Gandhi’s last 133 days of his life spent in Delhi is neatly written, with his ideology put in sharp focus. His ahimsa (non-violence) is not the passive resistance of the feeble who dare not exhibit his violent temper before a formidable enemy, but the non-violence of the brave, who is not afraid to die for his convictions. He advised the Hindus and Sikhs of New Delhi against retaliating in the same coin in response to brutal murder, rape, pillage and loot inflicted on their co-religionists fleeing Pakistan for dear life. It is to be stressed here that rape of women began in Pakistan and Gandhi himself acknowledges this fact in his public speeches like, “it all started from there” (p.252), “after all, madness seized us only after it had seized people in Pakistan” (p.263) and ”if someone is asked to embrace Islam or be prepared to die, he must choose death” (p.273). But the Indians quickly learned the methods themselves and inflicted terror in equal measure on Indian Muslims fleeing to Pakistan. Later, the Mahatma himself became aware of the fallacy and sheer impracticality of his opinions like a truly chaste woman couldn’t be raped. In the end, Gandhi advocated violence as a measure of self defense, when Pakistani infiltrators attacked Kashmir in a bid to forcibly annex the state and claim a fait accompli. India airlifted its troops to Srinagar, obtaining the Kashmiri ruler’s signature on the accession pact in the bargain. Paranjape counters the arguments of the conspirators who killed Gandhi that he was weakening the Hindus and Sikhs and appeasing the Muslims. Several examples are cited, which prove the author’s point. The tone of the second part of the book is so fundamentally different from the first, so as to cause confusion among the readers on whether those are penned by different authors.

The book is gifted with a good index and extensive reading list. Notes section is comprehensive, but a few photographic plates would’ve added more interest to the readers.

The book is recommended.

Rating: 2 Star