INDIRA GANDHI

Introduction
Indira Priyadarshini Gandhi was the third Prime Minister of India and a central figure of the
Indian National Congress party. Gandhi, who served from 1966 to 1977 and then again from
1980 until her assassination in 1984, is the second-longest-serving Prime Minister of India
and the only woman to hold the office.
Indira Gandhi was the only child of Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru. She served as
the Chief of Staff of her father's highly centralized administration between 1947 and 1964
and came to wield considerable unofficial influence in government. Elected Congress
President in 1959, she was offered the premiership in succession to her father. Gandhi refused
and instead chose to become a cabinet minister in the government. She finally consented to
become Prime Minister in succession to Lal Bahadur Shastri in 1966.

As Prime Minister, Gandhi became known for her political ruthlessness and unprecedented
centralization of power. She presided over a period where India emerged with greater power
than before to become the regional hegemony of South Asia with considerable political,
economic, and military developments. Gandhi also presided over a state of emergency from
1975 to 1977 during which she ruled by decree and made lasting changes to the constitution
of India. She was assassinated in the aftermath of Operation Blue Star.
In 2001, Gandhi was voted the greatest Indian Prime Minister in a poll organized by India
Today. She was also named "Woman of the Millennium" in a poll organized by the BBC in
1999.
Early life and career
Indira Priyadarshini Gandhi was the third Prime Minister of India and a central figure of the
Indian National Congress party. Gandhi, who served from 1966 to 1977 and then again from
1980 until her assassination in 1984, is the second-longest-serving Prime Minister of India
and the only woman to hold the office.
Indira Gandhi was the only child of Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru. She served as
the Chief of Staff of her father's highly centralized administration between 1947 and 1964
and came to wield considerable unofficial influence in government. Elected Congress
President in 1959, she was offered the premiership in succession to her father. Gandhi refused
and instead chose to become a cabinet minister in the government. She finally consented to
become Prime Minister in succession to Lal Bahadur Shastri in 1966.
As Prime Minister, Gandhi became known for her political ruthlessness and unprecedented
centralization of power. She presided over a period where India emerged with greater power
than before to become the regional hegemon of South Asia with considerable political,
economic, and military developments. Gandhi also presided over a state of emergency from
1975 to 1977 during which she ruled by decree and made lasting changes to the constitution
of India. She was assassinated in the aftermath of Operation Blue Star.
In 2001, Gandhi was voted the greatest Indian Prime Minister in a poll organised by India
Today. She was also named "Woman of the Millennium" in a poll organised by the BBC in
1999.

Milestone
Milestones in Indira Gandhi's life:
Nov 19, 1917: Indira is born
1938: Joins Indian National Congress
1942: Marries Feroze Gandhi
Sep 11, 1942: Couple is imprisoned at Naini Central jail, Allahabad, on
charges of subversion
1947-1964: Remains with her father Jawaharlal Nehru as hostess and close supporter
1947: Under Mahatma Gandhi's instructions, Indira Gandhi works in riot-affected areas of
Delhi.
1953-57: Serves as chairman of the Central Social Welfare Board
1955: Becomes member of Congress Working Committee and Central Election Committee
1956: Becomes member of Central Parliamentary Board
1956-60: Becomes president of Youth Congress
1960: Feroze Gandhi, her husband, dies
1964: Nehru, her father, dies
1964: Elected to parliament in his place
1964-66: Serves as minister of information and broadcasting
1966: Becomes prime minister after death of Lal Bahadur Shastri
1971: Calls for general election and wins by an enormous margin
- Declares war with Pakistan over Bangladesh

- India's first satellite launched into space

1973: Demonstrations in country over soaring prices and corruption
1974: India tests nuclear device.
June 1975: High Court of Allahabad finds her guilty of illegal practices during election
campaign;

ordered

to

vacate

her

Lok

Sabha

seat.
- Declares state of emergency. Thousands jailed.
1977: Calls for early elections but loses.
- Faces charges of corruption and authoritarianism, is expelled from parliament and is
imprisoned.
1978: Released from prison
- Resigns from Congress
- Becomes leader of Indian National Congress
- Wins seat through by-election
1980: Re-elected as prime minister
- Sanjay Gandhi, her youngest son, dies in plane crash
June 1984: To crush secessionist movement in Punjab, she launches Operation Blue Star.
Sends troops into the Golden Temple of Amritsar.
Oct 31, 1984: Indira Gandhi is assassinated by her Sikh bodyguards.

Achievements
Indira Gandhi was one of the most charismatic leaders of modern India whose ideas and
activities touched different spheres of India's public life and politics and left an imprint on

world affairs, especially, the Non-alignment Movement. She was the Prime Minister for over
fifteen-and-half years.
Born on 19 November 1917 at Allahabad to Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru and Kamala Nehru
Indira Priyadarshini was educated at Viswa Bharati University, and Oxford, and became
involved in political life almost from childhood.
In 1942 Indira married Feroze Gandhi. She became a member of the Congress Working
Committee in 1955 and was elected President in 1959. She became a member of the Cabinet
of Lal Bahadur Shastri as Minister for Information. In 1966 on the sudden demise of
Shastriji, she was made the Prime Minister.
Indira Gandhi strengthened the democratic structure and tradition of India. She had
tremendous influence on the masses. Among the major achievements of Indira Gandhi as
Prime Minister were India's role during the liberation war in Bangladesh including humane
handling of refugees and winning of 1971 war against Pakistan. She gave direction to India's
economy to reach the declared objectives of democratic socialism and greater social justice
for weaker sections. It was under her leadership that the signing of Shimla Pact with Pakistani
Premier Z.A. Bhutto and the signing of Indo-Soviet Treaty of Peace, Friendship and
Cooperation took place. She nationalised banks, abolished privy purses of maharajas and
conducted the first nuclear tests at Pokhran. The imposition of emergency rule in 1975 proved
to be a major mistake that she realised later.
Indira Gandhi was deeply interested in literature, music and fine arts. Various cultural
institutions, performing artists, educationists, intellectuals received her patronage and
encouragement. She was proud of India's cultural heritage and it was on her initiative that
Asiatic Society, Calcutta received the status of an institution and national importance. She
was conferred Bharat Ratna in 1971.
Indira Gandhi passed into history when she fell to the assassin's bullets on 31 October 1984 at
her residence. These assassins were none other than her own security men. As a mark of
respect to the departed leader her birthday is observed as National Integration Day.

Qualities
I have chosen Indira Gandhi because I had the longest term with her. The qualities of
fearlessness, courtesy, humour, wide interests and wisdom, deep commitment to Indian
science and technology, passion for the environment, objectivity and the ability to see many
things through not only a national but also an international prism -- these were some aspects
of her life and personality which come out in the episodic narrative I have chosen to adopt.
Fearlessness
I single this out as the strongest trait -- fearlessness to do what she thought was in the national
interest and fearlessness in the personal sense; physical and mental courage in adverse
circumstances. This was translated into courage which infected others.
I am reminded of the golden age of the Independence struggle when leaders led from the
front as in the case of T Prakasam or G B Pant, who always stood in the first row to face
bullets orlathis.
It was the hallmark of Indira Gandhi's father Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, who one remembers in
the Avadi Congress session jumping into an enclosure to calm down some misguided sections
which was trying to disturb the proceedings unmindful of the appeals of even Kamaraj
Nadar!
One example in her life was when the door opened in the aircraft where she was sitting alone
in the front cabin soon after take-off. The advice from the cockpit asking her to go to the back
section was not heeded and when we tried to persuade her to come back she gave only a
disarming smile which radiated her fearlessness. She did not leave the seat until we landed.
Of course, one has read about the fearless way she handled the Bangladesh war and other
similar situations, putting the national interest above those of personal safety.
Courtesy
As for courtesy, she had this in abundant measure and was the picture of friendliness with
whomsoever, she interacted, whether it was a poor lady in a village in Medak district (of
which was an MP) or a visiting dignitary from abroad.

The manner in which she reciprocated Cuban President Fidel Castro's bear hug at the Non
Aligned Summit is etched in memory. She responded shyly, but without fuss, thus cementing
a friendship.
The only occasion when I found her losing her cool was when we were in the Andaman
islands, visiting the Onge tribe there. As the helicopter hovered above the settlement built for
the Onges, she asked me to find out what the tin roofed structures were.
When we landed I found out these were hutments made for the Onges who normally lived in
small huts on treetops and moved from place to place as their defecation mounds grew under
the trees. This was ecologically sustainable as the land was nourished and they had a cooler
micro-climate atop the trees.
When I reported this to her, I realised she was upset. To compound this, the Onges who were
clad in multi-coloured T-shirts were brought for dancing around her. When she asked the
anthropologist present whether this was their usual mode of dress, he whispered they were
not in the habit of wearing anything except a brief loin cloth and both men and women were
bare-bodied.
On hearing this, she was in a rage and asked all the officers present if they realised what they
had done this to these innocent people by locating them in hot tin sheds, away from their
natural habitat and worse, making them wear ill-fitting and colourful clothes which they were
not used to.
She thundered if they thought the prime minister of India would hesitate to talk to her people
whether in their clothes or lack of it and how they had destroyed most of their values forever.
Humour
Indira Gandhi was not given to flippant humour, but showed flashes of mature humour on
occasions.
Thus when the Indian Board for Wildlife was meeting and there were two consecutive items
on the agenda, one relating to Save the Crocodile Project and the other to the scrapping of the
Andhra Pradesh Preservation of the Elephants Act, I scribbled a note to her to say this was

like the 'Gajendra Moksha' in reverse. She laughed heartily and read this out loudly to the
members of the Board.
This got me into some difficulty with the Andhra Pradesh forest minister when we left the
meeting and he said I have created a situation to seem as if the AP government was being
insensitive to the cause of conservation, even though the ground reality was that there were
no elephants in the state and there was no point in continuing an archaic enactment as a
successor to the old Madras state.
I told him politely this was said in good humour and there was no reason why Andhra
Pradesh should not have wild elephants now. Soon after this episode one was happy to know
that wild elephants have indeed come into Andhra Pradesh in Chittoor district and now have a
sanctuary for themselves!
The other bit of humour was displayed by the prime minister when she came up to me sitting
in the officers's box in Parliament. When I tried to stand up deferentially, she smiled and said,
"Don't tower over me like that. Sit down" and let my tall frame go back into the chair and
shaking in mirth!
Interests
Her wide interests and wisdom were manifested often in the midst of all the routine and
pressure of work. Whenever she found time, especially on domestic air travel, she would read
a book.
Her interests were in a wide spectrum and covered not only the economic and political issues
which were the daily bread and butter in her office but also discussions on India's future in
wrestling with problems of education, health and employment.
After a visit to Medak where she saw the good effects on welfare, hygiene, nutrition and
health of women and children as a result of a pilot Integrated Child Development Services
Project a few years after it was wound up, she included this in her Twenty Point Programme.

Her interests extended to our culture, heritage and the arts; testimony to which is the present
day INTACH (the Indian National Trust for Art and Cultural Heritage) and IGNCA (the
Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts), for which the ground work was done in her time.
She could visualise India's future lay in new initiatives in electronics, renewable sources of
energy, ocean development, bio technology and entrepreneurship development in young
technocrats to turn job seekers into job givers.