The History of the Future

Babu Jagjivan Ram became the Defence Minister in Morarji Desai's Cabinet. There was an intense rivalry within the coalition, with Jagjivan Ram nursing ambitions to become the next prime minister.

Around the same time, Indira Gandhi's daughter-in-law Maneka Gandhi launched her own magazine "Surya". Indira called up her old friend Khushwant Singh and asked him to help her out with the magazine. Maneka's mother Amteshwar Anand also approached Khushwant at his home with the request to help her daughter. Khushwant Singh, then editor of the National Herald, acceded, and became a consulting editor for "Surya", and ended up writing or re-writing most of its articles.

One fine morning, Khushwant Singh reached his office at Surya, and saw an envelope containing nine perfectly clear pictures of Jagjivan Ram's 40-year old son Suresh Ram in various compromising positions with a 21-year old stunningly beautiful student of Delhi University, Sushma Chaudhary. The pictures had been taken with a self-timed camera by Suresh Ram himself, and were snatched from his Mercedes by the political rivals of Jagjivan Ram who had been tracking him.

In Khushwant Singh's own words, "If Kamasutra had 64 poses, then those pictures at least had 9."

Khushwant Singh recalls that Maneka Gandhi was very keen to use the pictures. For her, this was the biggest journalistic scoop of her career. Perhaps the thought never even crossed her mind that Suresh Ram was not a politician. His only crime was that he was a womanizer and the son of Jagjivan Ram. And Sushma Chaudhary, a simple, middle-class girl from a respectable family whose only crime was that she was in love with Suresh Ram. Sushma or her simple family’s self-respect evidently ranked nowhere in Maneka’s larger scheme of things.

Maneka Gandhi knew exactly what she had to do to consolidate her position with her powerful mother-in-law. The pictures were published as a center-spread in Surya, and the sex scandal rocked the entire nation. It effectively put a permanent end to Jagjivan Ram's political ambitions, and gave rise to a far poorer alternative, Charan Singh.

It was political conspiracy at its best, and it was sleazy even by the lowliest journalistic standards. Suresh Ram had nothing to do with politics, and he got used as a target along with his extra-marital lover.

Precisely thirty years later, the political clock has turned a full circle, when someone secretly recorded the CDs of Maneka Gandhi's only child Varun Gandhi, and gave it back to her in a fantastic manner.

It is actually unsurprising that not a single journalist in the entire country seems to have noticed this fascinating connection between Maneka’s past and Varun’s present. History may have a lot to teach, but it is hardly a hot-selling subject in today’s era of TRPs.

One does not need a degree in psychology to understand that Varun is a natural product of his mother's hatred against Indira Gandhi who found her younger daughter-in-law to be of no use after her son died, and threw her out of the house.

Varun's hate speeches and his nonsensical chants of "Jai Shri Ram" have actually nothing to do with Ram. They have everything to do with his congenital hatred for his estranged family, including his aunt and cousins.

Maneka Gandhi is a classic case study in pathological hatred and jealousy. It is unfortunate that she ended this way, and fed the offspring of Sanjay Gandhi on so much venom.

But for once, destiny's sense of humor against Maneka Gandhi has been absolutely spectacular. I guarantee you there are at least two people who must be laughing out loud in their graves at destiny's rib-tickling joke of the century: Babu Jagjivan Ram and his son, Suresh Ram who died of heart failure at 46. And yes, a third one too, a woman who perhaps leads a quiet existence today, and owes the perfect public violation of her body and soul to Maneka Gandhi.

Let's end with a gem from that great Pakistani poet of the last century, Ahmed Faraz: (Only those who understand the meaning of love, will be able to understand it, even though it is meant for the consumption of Varun Gandhi):

Tu dashna-e-nafrat ko hi lehraata rahaa hai

Tu ney kabhi dushman sey lipat kar nahin dekha?

You have been brandishing the sword of hate

Do you know how it feels when you embrace the enemy?