Few remember late lamented Inderjit Gupta today. Those who do, merely know him for being elected to the Lok Sabha for nine terms. He was one of the last of a generation of privileged Indians who sacrificed the advantages of birth to serve the nation. His father, a civil service officer, rose to become India's Accountant and Comptroller General. Gupta attended public schools in Simla and went over to St. Stephens, Delhi and King's College in London for higher studies.
But some of the sterling qualities of Gupta are hardly ever recalled in public. All through his Parliamentary career he lived in a single room of Western Court (actually meant for accommodation of guests of MPs). When he held the Home portfolio under United Front Government (1996-98), he added the adjacent room to his 'residence'. It was at a time when a nominated Rajya Sabha MP, a noted film actress and one never to hide her socialist proclivities, fought for a bungalow in the Lutyen's Delhi, against her entitlement for a flat as the first time MP.
The current austerity drive by the Union government may have driven out two high-profile ministers from five-star hotels in the capital. But urge to flaunt status and privilege has taken such firm roots among our elite politicians that such temporary directives are all likely to be cast into the dustbins. GOs to the effect may soon land in highway side hovel sweet shops to wrap village burfi and may hold a lesson or two for the casual reader among the rural folks, but not the mighty netas.
Gupta's tribe is fast vanishing. People who could translate values imparted by the freedom struggle to day-to-day politics are not only rare, but run the risk of being dubbed 'impractical' at the best or 'obsessed with self-righteousness' at the worst. Another such leader, one could recall, was former chief minister of Tripura, Nripen Chakraborty. The man carried just one trunk of material when he moved into chief minister's house. Ten years later when he demitted the office, he had the same one trunk to be carried back to his house on a rickety cycle rickshaw.
Former Karnataka chief Minister Nijalingappa did not build a house in Bangalore. Kamaraj lived and died like a common man, never falling for loaves and fishes of office. But a former President demanded and occupied a government bungalow in Bangalore a few years before his death despite owning a palatial house in his ancestral village in Anantapur.
Around the early 90s, news readers in the capital were shocked to see front pages splattered with pictures of Gulzarilal Nanda, Home Minister in Nehru's cabinet (and twice interim prime minister) sitting on a sidewalk. He had been evicted from his rented house in New Delhi's Defence Colony for failure to pay monthly rents. He remained steadfast with his commitment to insulate himself from desire and politics of material acquisition inasmuch as he never owned any house, anywhere. It was only then that we could know that this man of frugal lifestyle was still around. Later her daughter went to Ahmedabad to see him die peacefully in 1998. It was only after great persuasion and pressure from a friend that he signed an application for the freedom fighter's pension of Rs. 500 a month. Not much later a reigning Governor of Punjab died while travelling to Simla, reportedly to ink a deal on behalf of the family for a five-star hotel. The plane he was using belonged to the State.
This reminds me of another incident. Mrs. Vijaylakshmi Pundit, Nehru's sister stayed for a couple of nights at a Government accommodation in Simla in late 50s. Knowing her connection and kinship with the prime minister, the lodge manager could hardly dare to demand the bill payment. When Nehru came to know of this, he sent a personal cheque to pay for sister's expenses. Such was Nehru's concern to stop misuse of his official position by his kinsfolk. No wonder then why his warning against corrupt bureaucrats use to strike fear.
Opulent lifestyles of our modern day corpulent politicians defy description. Few have patience to restrict themselves to official privileges, which in themselves allow a life of no less grandeur. Amid this urge to splurge of our netas, the common man finds no role models that are in sync with harsh social and economic realities of our vast underfed, unwashed multitudes.
With high offices reeking with corruption, extremely ordinary Government functionaries such as power board meter readers owning houses of demi-mansion proportions, and civil service officials leading flashy lifestyles, one wonders if we have any scope for returning to those halcyon days of democracy when an austere Kamaraj commanded respect and people were beholden to a diminutive yet spartan Lal Bahadur Shastri. They bound the nation with their selflessness and wielded moral authority over party cadres. Today's politicians and bureaucrats have to be protected from people, lest proximity allow chinks to have a peek into their glitzy, glamorous private lives dripping with ill-gotten millions. No wonder why their writ does not run beyond their flunkeys who survive on the loaves and fishes of office disbursed by them.
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November 2009 |
