BOOKWATCH
Revival of a legacy
SUDDENLY, there are so many fresh editions of Jawaharlal Nehru's books that one cannot be faulted for wondering whether they have anything to do with the changed political climes in the country. The first six months of the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance Government at the Centre alone has seen at least half a dozen re-runs of Nehru's letters; five from one publishing stable alone.
No doubt, the surprise return of Congress to the helm of affairs at the Centre has put an abrupt stop to the Nehru-bashing of the past six years, but for the record it must be said that Penguin had secured the rights to publish three of his most celebrated works at a time when no-one was willing to give his party a whisker of a chance at the hustings. In fact, the second quarter edition of Penguin Post announces the Penguin edition of The Discovery of India, An Autobiography, and Glimpses of World History with considerable fanfare.
And, with good reason. Even in the days when the Nehruvian legacy was sought to be wiped out, his books were among the fast-moving titles of many a bookshop. After a high-profile release of these three titles on Independence Day-eve, November — the month of both Nehru and Indira Gandhi's birthdays — saw the arrival of three more titles based on India's First Family's letters: Two alone, Two together: Letters between Indira Gandhi & Jawaharlal Nehru (1922-1964) edited by Sonia Gandhi, Letters from a Father to His Daughter by Jawaharlal Nehru with a foreword by Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, and Before Freedom: Nehru's Letters to His Sister (1909-1947) edited by Nayantara Sahgal.
Together, they span Nehru's entire adult life; from the time he turned 20 to his twilight years. The content apart, Two Alone and Letters from a Father also signal the passage of the Nehru-Gandhi legacy to another generation from the hitherto sole custodian, Sonia Gandhi. The copyright of Two alone is now jointly held by the Nehru-Gandhi siblings, Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, while the text copyright of Letters from a Father rests solely with the latter.
Billed as "tender written dialogue" by Sonia Gandhi, these letters show Nehru mature from a loving elder brother to a doting father and become the statesman that he is remembered as. Since Two Alone and Before Freedom are collections of correspondence between father-daughter and brother-sister (Nehru and Vijayalakshmi Pandit) respectively, the two books also throw light on the blossoming of two important women in Nehru's life into public figures.
Doubling up as a narrative on what was happening around them — essentially, details of the freedom struggle that was practically spearheaded from the family residence in Allahabad — the letters have historical value despite being personal. Of particular relevance to a polity where secularism has become the defining line is a letter written by Indira Gandhi in 1947 from Lucknow.
In this letter, she dwells at length on the growing influence of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh. Sample this: "The growth of this organisation is so amazingly like the Brown Shirts of Germany, that if we are not very quick on our toes it will grow beyond our control and beyond the control also of the industrialists who are now financing it (just as happened to Thyssen & others in Germany). The recent history of Germany is too close for us to be able to forget it for an instant. Are we inviting the same fate to our country? The Congress organisation has already been engulfed — most Congressmen approve of these tendencies. So do Government servants of all ranks and positions... the German social-democrats & others persist in believing that somehow, at some stage, the Brown Shirts would be suppressed or that the movement would die a natural death. And that was the undoing of the German people. Let us not fall into the same trap."
While Two Alone is an abridged version of two separate volumes — Freedom's Daughter and Two Alone, Two Together — published in Britain over a decade ago, Before Freedom was first published just four years ago by HarperCollins. This time around, Sahgal has thrown in some "exclusive photographs" and new letters — primarily a poignant letter from Nehru to his sister after the death of her husband.
Also, Sahgal has edited her May 10, 2000, introduction — removing the bitterness she articulated in 2000 over the Nehru legacy being in the "hands of those who did not know him, and those who so little understood his fastidious mind and the republican ideal he served that they see no contradiction in using his name to sanction inherited leadership in his party".
Two Alone, Two Together: Letters between Indira Gandhi & Jawaharlal Nehru (1922-64), edited by Sonia Gandhi, Penguin, Rs. 595.
Letters from a Father to His Daughter, Jawaharlal Nehru (foreword by Priyanka Gandhi Vadra), Puffin, Rs. 250.
Before Freedom: Nehru's Letters to His Sister (1909-1947), edited by Nayantara Sahgal, Roli, Rs. 495.
ANITA JOSHUA
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