This write-up is a response to the article titled “In defense of Nehru”, which was published in the Hindu newspaper on 17^th April 2018. The article written in the Hindu newspaper can be read here: http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/op-ed/in-defence-of-nehru/article23563560.ece .

The author had mentioned that Nehru had envisioned for a modern secular state but in the next line of the article, there is a megalithic contradiction where the author writes “When asked why he was so strident in attacking Hindu communalism while he soft-peddled on Muslim communalism, he replied that it was because majority communalism was far more dangerous since it could easily pass off as Indian nationalism.” Hindu communalism during Nehru times is an exaggerated issue according to many modern scholars and the presence of Hindu communalism at the time is debatable but even if we think in the lines of Jawaharlal Nehru that Hindu communalism was prevalent at that time, the actions of Nehru violates ideal secularism. The ideal secular state is where all religions are treated in an equal way and hence the wrongdoings of all groups in name of any religion should be condemned. Attacking Hindu communalism and soft-peddling Muslim communalism should be labeled as minorityism not secularism.

To discuss more on this, here is a part of letter written by Nehru to the state chief ministers during 1952, where he writes:

“I have sometimes received complaints from Christian missions and missionaries, both foreign and Indian, about the differential treatment accorded to them in some States. It is said that there is some kind of harassment also occasionally. Some instances of this kind have come to my notice. I hope that your Government will take particular care that there is no such discrimination, much less harassment. I know that there is a hangover still of the old prejudice against Christian missions and missionaries. In the old days, many of them, except in the far South, where they were indigenous, represented the foreign power and sometimes even acted more or less as its agents. I know also that some of them in the north-east encouraged separatist and disruptive movements. That phase is over. If any person, foreign or Indian, behaves in that way still, certainly we should take suitable action. But we must remember that Christianity is a religion of large numbers of people in India and that it came to the South of India nearly 2000 years ago. It is as much part of the Indian scene as any other religion. Our policy of religious neutrality and protection of minorities must not be affected or sullied by discriminatory treatment or harassment. While Christian missionaries have sometimes behaved objectionably from the political point of view, they have undoubtedly done great service to India in the social fields and they continue to give that service.”

This clearly shows the soft corner of Nehru towards the Christian missionaries under the tag of secularism. He was well aware of the problems they possessed including separatism but was under an illusion that the separatist phase was over. He also had written that their disruptive activities should be condemned but never really did so. This later paved way for separatist organizations in North East like National Socialist Council of Nagaland and National Liberation Front of Tripura with the ideology of Evangelical Christianity. This doesn’t only show that Nehruvian secularism is none other than the minorityism but also gave more space for separatist organizations to be born in North-east India, which had become very hard to counter in past few decades.

The author misleadingly writes, “Unlike Gandhi who believed in the idea of an India constituted of autonomous village communities with all the caste and economic inequities they harbored, Nehru was committed to the establishment of a strong Indian state where the concept of equal rights of citizens would override all societal divisions”. Gandhi’s idea of autonomous villages is just a system of decentralization for the self-development of villages, which has no relation with caste or economic inequalities. The concept of equal rights was given to the people of India by the constitution of India and this credit should be given to the great Dr.Ambedkar and the constituent assembly. By writing these lines, the author had tried to denigrate Gandhi and wrongly credit Nehru, which have no reasonable bases.     

There was mention in the article about India’s dual track nuclear program and the complete credit was given to him for this. Indian nuclear scientist, Homi.J.Bhabha was the one who was pressing for nuclear research center in India since 1935, which was later formed in 1944. Bhabha was continuously pressing for nuclear weapons and this paved way for India’s dual track nuclear program. As it was started during the regime of Nehru, credit should be given to him but his later actions will give us a different opinion.   In a meeting attended by both Nehru and Bhabha in 1960, Nehru asked Bhabha whether he could make an atom bomb for which he received a positive response from Bhabha and then he asked the time it would take for the process to get over. Bhabha replied that he could make it in one year but for which Nehru surprisingly replied “Well, don’t do it until I tell you”. Few months before Nehru’s death, when reports emerged about Chinese nuclear spadework and suggestions were made to him on construction of nuclear weapons for deterrence, he refused the proposal completely.

Ex-president of USA, John F Kennedy was ready to help India with nuclear deterrence as he felt this should be done by a democratic country like India not communist China but Nehru politely rejected the offer. If Nehru had accepted the offer India tested the nuclear weapon first in Asia also it could have prevented the Chinese invasion of 1962.

The author also writes that, “It was he who established the robust tradition of civilian supremacy over the military that prevented India from becoming another junta-ruled Third World autocracy”. It is true that Nehru was responsible for civilian supremacy over military. This gave the country’s defense strategic decision making power to the political leadership, which is him. With such a power, he failed to realize the need to strengthen the military of India to protect itself, which ultimately led to a war with China. Brigadier JP Dalvi, who was an army officer during Sino-Indian war, wrote a book named “The Himalayan Blunder”, where he had written about the war and also his personal experiences, where he mentions about the lack of weapons, grand strategy and even basic needs like boots and glasses for the war.

Indian former army chief KS Thimayya, who held the post till 1961 had alerted Nehru many times regarding the frailty of Indian army to defend itself against a Chinese invasion and his solicitations were never addressed by Nehru.  During his retirement in 1961, he uttered in his farewell speech that “I hope I am not leaving you as cannon fodder for the Chinese. God bless you all.”, but unfortunately his fear came true.

In the biographical book of Major general A.A.Rudra titled “Major General A.A. Rudra: His Service in Three Armies and Two World Wars”, Major general Palit writes “Shortly after independence, General Lockhart as the army chief took a strategic plan to the prime minister, asking for a government directive on the defense policy. He came back to Jick's office shell-shocked. When asked what happened, he replied, The PM took one look at my paper and blew his top. 'Rubbish! Total rubbish!' he shouted. 'We don't need a defense plan. Our policy is ahimsa (non-violence). We foresee no military threats. Scrap the army! The police are good enough to meet our security needs' ”. Having civilian supremacy over military can be good only if political leadership uses his power to improve the military power and strengthen the defense but unfortunately, Jawaharlal Nehru was caught in the illusion of Ahimsa and failed to vitalize our military.

As the author had mentioned, Nehru should be credited for investing in heavy industries but his investment was majorly in public sector. His restrictions to private sector hindered our economic growth. As our economy after independence is very small, we should have start growing at a rate of more than 5% at least after 6-7 years after independence as smaller economy should grow faster than bigger economies. This was continued by his daughter and curtailment of private industries became much tougher during Indira’s rule. This led to the balance of payment crisis in 1990 and was rectified only by P.V.Narasimha Rao by his historic economic reforms in 1991.  

Nehru’s non-alignment’s failure was discussed completely by many scholars and writers. The line which looks completely flawed in the article while discussing non-alignment is where the author says “Unlike Pakistan’s subservient relationship with the U.S., non-alignment set the stage for a fruitful arms supply relationship with the Soviet Union without compromising India’s strategic goals”. Non alignment is the major reason for Pakistan’s relationship with USA. Nehru advocated that India didn’t align with any country but indirectly aligned with USSR and this prompted USA to have a relationship with Pakistan, the enemy of soviet ally India.

Nehru’s ideas were more idealistic but completely lacked realistic flavor and thus his policies were far off from reality except few. His ideas like non-alignment, secularism and socialism were flawed, which was not realized by him and this led to crisis in defense, foreign policy and economy.