Earlier this month, there was much uproar when the BJP government avoided mentioning Indira Gandhi during the 50th-anniversary celebration of Bangladesh Liberation. Political opponents of BJP were upset that the then prime minister, a woman, and the architect of Bangladesh Liberation was not given due credit by the present government. Gandhi’s granddaughter, Priyanka Vadra, had accused the government of misogyny.
Just a couple of days later, the nation had also celebrated the 60th anniversary of the liberation of Goa. Yet again, the BJP governments (both central and state) did not mention the then prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru, or the architect of Goa Liberation – VK Krishna Menon, then the defence minister. Ironically, not even a murmur was heard from the Congress, Nehru’s own namesake descendants, or the “historians”.
Credit Given To Military Leaders, But Selectively!
In both cases, the BJP government chose to hand over the credit to the armed forces and not to the political leaders. This, of course, is driven by the fact that both events took place under Congress governments, but much after the demise of BJP’s icon, Sardar Patel.
BJP, who supposedly adopts the leaders “disowned by Congress“, should have embraced Menon. Unlike Patel or Lal Bahadur Shastri, for whom tears are usually shed, Menon was even denied the ticket by the Congress in 1967 to the North Bombay constituency, which he won with spectacular margins in 1957 and 1962 general elections.
In the case of Bangladesh, tributes were paid to the Chief of Army Staff Sam Manekshaw for his leadership. However, in the case of Goa Liberation, the architect of the military operation, then Chief of General Staff, Lt Gen Brij Mohan Kaul, never gets the mention.
The purpose of this hypocrisy and discrimination, even among the military ranks, is clear. Praising either Menon or Kaul will dilute the misinformation fabricated against Jawaharlal Nehru.
All the decades of falsehoods perpetuated by historians and the ex-servicemen against these individuals in light of Sino-Indian Conflict in October 1962 will collapse like a house of cards if Indians find out their magnificent contributions to the spectacular military success in Goa just ten months earlier.
Sardar Patel And Goa
PM Modi has claimed that Goa could have been liberated much sooner if Patel had lived a little longer. This is not a new claim. Many Goan and national BJP leaders made this claim earlier without explaining how they arrived at that conclusion. No historian nor Congressman ever questioned the rationality behind such a conclusion.
Patel lived until the end of 1950, while Goa was liberated in 1961. So how long should Patel have lived before he could liberate Goa? Two or three more years? How could Patel liberate Goa in 1953? Was there a specific circumstance that could have allowed Patel?
I do not understand how the Minister of Home Affairs, Patel, could have any authority under the Indian Constitution to liberate Goa, which was under colonial Portugal. But why worry about Goa which was liberated anyway? It would have been great if Patel conquered PoK, Gilgit and Baltistan instead.
I’m sure they will argue that Patel had saddled his horse and assembled the army, but Nehru had stopped the march. But then, how could one be sure if Nehru would allow Patel to march on Goa in 1953?
Contributions Of South Indians Don’t Matter
The army was ordered to invade Hyderabad in September 1948 by then governor-general and supreme commander of the armed forces, Chakravarti Rajagopalachari (Rajaji or CR). Yet, the credit is brazenly handed to a Gujarati. Knowingly or unknowingly, everyone in India perpetuates this fake history.
The contributions of Menon, Rajaji, Pattabhi Sitaramayya and innumerable other South Indians have been systematically robbed by Indian historians and politicians. Many perpetrators are historians and South Indians themselves. They probably think, toeing the line of North Indian point of view is their patriotic duty.
South Indians betraying their own icons is unfortunate. They sympathize with trumped-up claims that Patel or Subhas Chandra Bose were wronged by Congress. Yet, they find nothing wrong with Patel undermining Nehru’s attempt to elect Rajaji as the President of India. Jairam Ramesh admiringly narrates Patel’s shrewdness in preventing Nehru from inducting Rajaji into the cabinet.
After Patel’s death, however, Nehru did induct Rajaji into his cabinet as the Minister of Home Affairs.