As I flipped the pages of times of india, tribute to gandhi repeatedly greeted me everywhere and in one corner of the page I saw tribute to lal bahadur shahtri and I came to know that 2nd october also happens to be the birthday of shastri. Even the politicians were shown visiting raj ghat and not vijay ghat; gandhi literally eclipsed shashtri. But I was glad to watch a documentray on shahstri in dd national.
Why shastri’s tenure as prime minister for about 20 months stands out? Shastri was able to bring about a sense of unity amongst the country men, face and lead successfully through the pakistan war and pave way for green and white revolution.
The syndicate led by kamaraj chose shastri over moraji sensing shastri to be rather timid and pliant; puppet government was the idea. However, the new incumbent amongst other initiatives dropped moraji form the cabinet and gave indira the useless information & broadcasting portfolio and the latter avenged by barring shastri entry into teen murti by having it declared as memorial to nehru. Indeed, delhi houses many such memorials!
The kutch conflict with pakistan served as an eye-opener to the shastri government and operation gibraltar and grand slam by pakistan to capture j&k and akhnur bridge were successfully thwarted. Here, shastri scored over nehru for sharsti was decisive and took full measures to see India emerge as victorious. Shashtri came out with the famous slogan, “jai jawan, jai kisan”, recognising the contributions of soldier and farmers.
Concerned about the food and drought situation, shastri appointed an able administrator, c.subramanium as minister for food and agriculture and thus came along high yielding varieties of seeds, application of fertilizers and attainment of self-sufficiency in food grains.
Many would have doubted shastri’s ability to run the country and the nehru’s long rule brought in the comparison factor. I am sure if shastri had continued for another term, india would have progressed leaps and bounds in each field for he was a statesman and not a run on the mill politician who is ever hungry for kursee. The resignation over the ariyalur rail accident by shastri speaks about the morality of the man and indeed, “only morality in our actions can give beauty and dignity to life” – Einstein.
I am ashamed to say - I did not know that October 2nd was also the birthday of Lal Bahadur Shastri!
ReplyDeleteI often wonder the path India might have taken had Shastri not died so mysteriously and unexpectedly. Perhaps we might have been spared the damage wrought on our country by what and who followed.