Rajaji

by Rajmohan Gandhi

  Evidently it was Nehru’s attitude towards Congress President Tandon that troubled C.R. the most. When Tandon did not heed Nehru’s counsel for action against some Punjab Congressmen, Jawaharlal told Tandon he would resign from the Parliamentary Board. Informing C.R. of his decision, Nehru said that he had ‘weighed all the consequences’ (9.6.51). Offended that Jawaharlal had neither consulted him nor informed him ahead of time, C.R. wrote:

  I have your letter telling me about your having written to Tandonji [of] your desire to resign from the Parliamentary Board. I see nothing but misfortune for the country in the line you are taking . . . You should tell me now when you will release me from Government. 1 think my usefulness is over. (9.6.51).

  Nehru did not press his resignation but soon another conflict arose. Kidwai and Ajit Prasad Jain, Ministers in the Nehru government and old opponents of Tandon, left the Congress to join the new Krishak Mazdoor Praja Party started by Acharya Kripalani. Kidwai left the government as well but Jain did not. When Tandon urged Jain’s removal, and the Congress executive in UP — the state to which Nehru, Tandon, Kidwai and Jain all belonged — joined in the demand, Nehru not only refused; he resigned from the Working Committee and the Parliamentary Board.

  Informed by Nehru of his resignations from Congress’s apex bodies, C.R. wrote back:

  I do not understand this. You should relieve me before you do all this and confuse and destroy the Congress. Please do not go mad (7.8.51).

  Tandon resigned the Presidentship, and Congress bodies across the nation passed resolutions asking Nehru to fill the vacated chair. Just a year earlier Nehru had said to Tandon that ‘it would be improper’ for him to preside over Congress ‘so long as I remain Prime Minister’ (8.8.50). Now, however, Nehru was willing to be persuaded and the party was willing to persuade.

  Early in September 1951, Nehru was elected President, his name proposed by Govind Ballabh Pant, the U.P. Chief Minister. Invited by Jawaharlal to join his Working Committee, C.R. declined.

  C.R.’s departure from Delhi seemed also linked to the elections that had been announced. The free vote was what C.R. had fought the British for; now he loathed the compromise with big money and vote-banks that elections seemed to entail. He found ticket-hungry Congressmen caught in ‘a fatal ecstasy,’ reminding him of ‘the lepideptora [that] fly into the burning flame to die.’26

  Nehru suggested that he stay until April the following year, when the new Parliament would be constituted, but C.R. replied that ‘an inner voice’ was compelling him to leave at the earliest. His decision was announced, but the published reasons, age and fatigue, did not disclose the whole truth.

  The deeper reality — his unhappiness and bitterness — is revealed in a letter he sent at this juncture to Mountbatten, who had proposed that C.R. should help Nehru by serving, even for a short while, as High Commissioner in London:

  You and Edwina are so intensely interested in Jawaharlal Nehru that, may I say, you have no eyes to see or mind to think about any others. Rajaji is just a match-stick to light the cigarette . . . You throw the match-stick into the ash-tray without a thought after it has served the purpose . . .

  I am so tired and so hungering for rest, you can’t guess it . . .

  My career is truly remarkable in its zigzag. Cabinet Minister, Governor without power, Governor-General when the constitution was to be wound up, Minister without Portfolio, Home Minister and parliamentary work, and now the proposition is Acting High Commissioner in the U.K.! Finally I must one day cheerfully accept a senior clerk’s place somewhere and raise that job to its proper importance (8.10.51).

  Across the border, Premier Liaqat Ali was assassinated. In a letter to Ghulam Mohammed, who became Pakistan’s Governor- General in a reshuffle, C.R. wrote:

  It is difficult to predict what is in store for us all. But if we three — yourself, Nazimuddin Saheb (the new Premier) and myself as private gentlemen — fail to recreate lasting wisdom and love between our two peoples, I should pass out in sadness (24.10.51).

  Learning of C.R.’s decision to retire, Rama Rao wrote a moving letter from Bangalore. He had not failed C.R. in half a century of friendship. Neither had C.R. ever let Rama Rao down. Aware of Rama Rao’s hunger for affection, C.R. tried to assuage it with letters and assurances. At the same time, with Rama Rao as perhaps with no one else, C.R. was himself, saying what came to mind.

  C.R. to Rama Rao, commenting on a newspaper picture sent by the latter of a doubtful holy man in the company of President Prasad, 9.3.50: I managed to keep exploiters at a good distance but poor Rajen Babu can’t do it.

  C.R. to Rama Rao, 1.12.50: Papa (C.R.’s daughter Namagiri) is excelling herself in her devotion, vigilant care and diligence. God indeed and everyone round about me have been so kind to me. I know what an unworthy soul I am. I am just unburdening myself.

  Rama Rao to C.R., on Patel’s death, 16.12.50: So far as I know — you will say I don’t know much — there is only one man who can complete [Patel’s] work.

  Rama Rao to C.R., 23.5.51: Here is something from Winston Churchill’s ‘The Second World War’: ‘I had recourse to a method of life which I found greatly extended my daily capacity for work. I always went to bed at least for one hour as early as possible in the afternoon.’

  C.R. to Rama Rao, 24.5.51: Am I as great as Winston Churchill because I too go to bed for one hour as early as possible in the afternoon and feel refreshed by the blessed oblivion?

  Rama Rao to C.R, 1.6.51: You are both of you great, and you both sleep in the afternoon, but I have seen a number of people free from all suspicions of greatness enjoy the ‘blessedness of oblivion’ between, before and after meals . . . In fact they are awake only during them.

  At a farewell meeting, C.R. said that henceforth ‘my prayers, not my brains, will help’ Nehru and his colleagues. Gracious as always, Jawaharlal gave a lunch for C.R. Prasad was present. Both were at Willingdon airport, as were Azad and other Ministers and diplomats, when on 1 November 1951 C.R. left for Madras. There citizens and rulers made the journey to Meenambakkam to welcome back the South’s tired, proud son. He was 73.

  20

  ‘Downfall’

  1951-54

  Back in his Bazlulla Road home, C.R. savoured the success of his Mahabharata — both the Tamil and English versions were sold out and reprints were in the pipeline. Jawaharlal wrote that ‘Delhi seems to be somewhat different without you. I feel rather lonely now’ (22.11.51).

  On his part C.R. was by no means clear about his own future. A suggestion (made by Rama Rao) that he should write his memoirs did not appeal to him. Apart from a horror of self- centred autobiographies, C.R. did not feel that all he had was his past.

  True, he had hungered for a break and was enjoying it. He read a lot, including Robert Louis Stevenson’s Thrillers. ‘You must have read these pieces long ago,’ he wrote to Rama Rao. ‘They were reserved for my second childhood.’ He enjoyed, too, an English translation of an old Tamil story of his own, saying to the translator: ‘I read it now in a state of complete non- remembrance of the story I wrote. I think — though I say it — it is a good story.’1

  And he agreed when Krishnamurti, editor of Kalki, proposed that he create, week by week, a version of the Ramayana for the journal. Yet he had not turned his back on the world — he had not, for one thing, resigned his seat in Parliament. When a newspaper reported that he ‘desired to live like a sanyasi,’ C.R. issued a prompt disclaimer: ‘I hope people will not take it that I made this claim or used this phrase.’ Intrigued by the disclaimer, a Bombay commentator wrote, ‘One wonders in what office he may turn up next’ (Times of India, 28.12.51).

  It was a shrewd observation, but the writer who made it must have been as startled as everyone else when, three months later, C.R. was sworn in as the Chief Minister of Madras!

  How did it happen? Led to the hustings by the charismatic Nehru, Congress did very well everywhere except in the South. Trickling in from early January to mid-February 1952,
the final results from Madras gave the Congress only 152 out of 375 seats. The Chief Minister, Kumaraswami Raja, and five of his cabinet had lost. The Communists won 61 seats, nine small parties found representation, and there were 63 successful independents.

  Congress’s debacle was most pronounced in Malabar, where it won only 4 out of 29 seats, and the Telugu country, where its tally was 43 out of 143. In the Tamil area it won 96 out of 190 (Narasimhan won the Krishnagiri Lok Sabha seat) and in South Kanara 9 out of 11. Reasons for the failure were soon supplied: a foodgrains crisis; loss of touch with the masses; Communist skill in playing on discontent; and the Andhra following of T. Prakasam, Chief Minister in 1946-7 and now a key figure in the Kripalani party.

  Though he had lost his own seat, Prakasam claimed the support, not proved, of a front of 166 MLAs, including the Communists and independents. Unable to choose between Prakasam’s claim and TNCC chief Kamaraj’s assertion that ‘only the Congress is going to rule,’ the Governor, Maharaja Krishnakumarsinhji of Bhavnagar, whose retirement was due, referred the question to the President.

  The Congress High Command, conferring in February and again in March, did not know what advice to give Nehru, who did not know what to advise the President, who was thus unable to send any word to the Governor. But by this time some in Madras felt they had found the answer: the South’s son who had done big things in the past and was now not doing much. Though he was 73, if with his prestige he formed a ministry, it would survive. Most of the smaller parties ‘and independents would support it.

  The solution occurred almost simultaneously to several: to Raja, who as the ‘caretaker’ though defeated Chief Minister could play an important card or two; to Ramnath Goenka, the newspaper proprietor who had fought C.R. over the Press Bill and, earlier, had striven to deny C.R. the new Republic’s Presidency; to C. Subramaniam, one of the successful Congress candidates, A.N. Sivaraman, editor of Dinamani, and others.

  Most Congressmen saw C.R.’s appointment as the way out. If he was drafted, their link with power could continue. If not, there would be President’s rule, if not Red rule. On 13 March The Hindu reported that Subramaniam as well as Congress’s local committee at Virudhunagar had appealed to C.R. to take up the leadership. It was the signal for a flood of resolutions and telegrams.

  The draft-C.R. forces received the enthusiastic backing of the Maharaja’s successor in the Governor’s seat, Sri Prakasa, who had just ended a term as a Minister at the centre. As Sri Prakasa would soon write (12.4.52) to President Prasad, ‘After endless parleys, everybody came to one and only one solution — that the only person who could save the situation was Rajaji.’2

  But would C.R. agree? When Goenka and Sivaraman called on him to probe his mind, he suggested President’s rule and prayers to providence. But they as well as Subramaniam and Pattabhirama Rao, a newly-elected Telugu MLA, who also called on C.R., surmised that he was open to the idea. However, visitors asking the direct question were told that he was too tired. On 24 March Kamaraj and Sanjiva Reddy, the APCC chief, informed Nehru that ‘attempts to persuade Rajaji’ had been ‘unsuccessful.’ Reporting this, The Hindu added that Nehru expressed ‘regret.’

  Meanwhile C.R. had taken off for Courtallam, the watering resort. He was terribly torn. The proposition was exciting — it brought the scent of poetic justice. For C.R. remembered, though no longer with bitterness, that Madras had rejected him six years earlier. Perhaps, he grinned under a Courtallam waterfall while contemplating Kamaraj’s inability to stop the run now towards him. And no doubt he recalled how enjoyable the 1937-9 Premiership of Madras had felt.

  Yes, he liked to run Madras. Moreover, power was pursuing him, rather than the other way round. Yet there was another side. Was it dignified for a former Governor-General to become a Chief Minister? Also, he would be acutely embarrassed if he showed willingness but Nehru was cool — so far Jawaharlal had not voiced support for the move to draft him. Again, Kamaraj, whose backing was crucial, had not yet come to him.

  Finally, and about this C.R. was perfectly clear, there was no question of his contesting a by-election. He had kept out of the Lok Sabha fray — in part at least out of disgust at the role of money in elections — and would not now ask to be voted to the Assembly. Though we have no direct evidence of it, another factor may have been an unwillingness in C.R., a Brahmin in an increasingly anti-Brahmin climate, to risk caste confrontation as well as possible defeat.

  In any case, Raja, Goenka, Subramaniam and company had been hard at work. On 29 March C.R. was back in Madras. That day the Congress Legislature Party unanimously resolved to request C.R. to lead it, and a delegation led by Raja that included Kamaraj and Reddy carried the resolution to C.R.’s first-floor room on Bazlulla Road.

  ‘You must save the province,’ said Raja. ‘You can stay on,’ C.R. said to Raja.3 This, earlier, had been Kamaraj’s proposal too. The idea was that Raja would be elected leader and later returned in a by-election, the procedure adopted in Bombay over Morarji Desai, who also had narrowly lost his seat but was wanted as Chief Minister by the party.

  ‘No, Rajaji,’ said Raja without hesitation. ‘I have come to request you to take the place.’ ‘At this rate,’ said Rajaji, ‘if Salem is in trouble you will ask me to become the municipal chairman.’ Then he pleaded his age, asked to be spared — and enquired if they had Nehru’s consent.

  On 30 March The Hindu quoted Raja as saying that C.R. ‘was still of the same mind and pleads inability, mainly for reasons of health.’ Raja added, however, that he, Kamaraj and Reddy would continue their efforts to persuade Rajaji. Since C.R. had deflected the ball towards Jawaharlal, it was to him now that the Madras party sent a deputation: Subramaniam and Mrs Soundaram Ramachandran.

  Calling on Nehru on the morning of 30 March, they presented the MLP resolution. Nehru made three points. One, he would not himself advise either the Madras party or Rajaji. Two, he would abide by the decision of the Madras party. Finally, if Rajaji agreed to take the lead, he should get himself elected as soon as possible to the lower house in Madras. Jawaharlal also sent, via the deputation, letters to Rajaji and Kumaraswami Raja. To C.R. he wrote:

  I had remained aloof for two reasons. One was that I did not feel justified in pressing you to undertake this heavy burden . . . The second reason was that I wanted the Madras Party to decide completely by itself . . . For my pan I naturally accept it.4

  On 31 March C.R. told Raja and Subramaniam that he was willing, but he also told them, as well as everyone else in Madras, that he was ‘absolutely definite that he would in no circumstances stand for election’ — to quote from Governor Sri Prakasa’s letters of 1.4.52 to Prasad and Nehru in Delhi.

  Now the Constitution was flexible enough to permit such obduracy: a member of the Upper House could function as Chief Minister. However, in his note to Raja, Nehru had written: ‘It must be understood of course that early steps will have to be taken for Rajaji’s election to the Madras Assembly.’5

  To install C.R. on his terms would amount to flouting Nehru’s wish, but the alternative was to lose C.R. and, with him, every chance of a Congress government. Raja and the Congress leaders of Madras chose the first course and, with Governor Sri Prakasa’s full cooperation, proceeded at once to swear C.R. in as Chief Minister, before Nehru could come to know of C.R.’s inflexible condition.

  A candid letter sent by Sri Prakasa to President Prasad on 1.4.52 described what happened in Madras:

  Yesterday was a day of great goings and comings; of tense moments of anxiety; of much hard thinking and heart searching as to what was right and ought to be done. I met the Chief Minister twice and Rajaji also was good enough to come and talk to me fully . . . I must not worry you with details; but late in the afternoon the clouds, luckily for all, cleared, and it was agreed:

  (i) that I should nominate Rajaji to the upper house, and in order that the matter may not look too obvious, I should nominate two or three other people along with him; (ii) that after this, the Congress
party in the assembly should unanimously elect Rajaji as their leader . . . The programme as detailed above went through to schedule . . .6

  C.R. was nominated under a constitutional clause that enabled a Governor, when advised by a Chief Minister, to send to the Upper House persons ‘having special knowledge in such matters as literature, science, art and social service.’ No doubt C.R. qualified under both literature and social service, but the clause was not quite conceived for accommodating a Chief Minister-to- be who thought poorly of elections. The spirit of the Constitution had been violated.

  Even apart from that, was it proper for C.R. to accept the Chief Ministership? When the possibility was first raised, ‘Kalki’ Krishnamurti likened it in his weekly to Ramana Maharshi becoming chairman of the Tiruvannamalai municipality. Reading a mistaken story that C.R. had rejected the pressure, Dr T.S.S. Rajan, C.R.’s old friend and ministerial colleague in the late thirties, wrote to him, ‘You have saved your self-respect.’7 ‘We had put Rajaji at the level of Delhi, not at Madras level,’ the leader of the opposition in Madras, Tenneti Viswanatham, would soon say.8

  In a defensive phrase in a letter to Nehru (4.4.52), C.R. referred to ‘the notion that all work is equally noble.’ Some, of course, admired the audacity of the 73-year-old C.R., including, predictably, Rama Rao, who wrote to his friend (1.4.52):

  Only an overpowering call of duty could justify this sacrifice . . . I remember Ruskin somewhere lauds the heroism of the tired guardian of the temple who leans half-fainting on his sword but springs up like fire to meet a menace.

  But the doubts did not disappear. The day after he was sworn in, C.R. himself said, ‘In my private journal I would call this my downfall’ (The Hindu, 2.4.52). We do not know whether he was referring to his acceptance of the leadership, or to the nomination, or to both. In a brave defence of the nomination in the Assembly, C.R. said: