Line of duty

Of Giants and Windmills: An Autobiography

Author: Moosa Raza

Publisher: Niyogi Books

Pages: 304

Price: Rs 650

More often than not, those who have had anything interesting and relevant to say in their memoirs have been the ones who defied, dared, and delivered despite all odds. Of Giants and Windmills is one such book by former Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer Moosa Raza.
 

Born in British-ruled India, in Tindivanam, a town in Viluppuram in Tamil Nadu, and raised in his maternal grandparents’ native village Minambur, Mr Raza is an author, consultant, and poetry aficionado who continues to write and work even in his eighties.
 

He joined the IAS in 1960. India had been an independent country for more than a decade and under the leadership of its first prime minister, policies were being taken every day to adjust to the needs of its growing population. For those policies to be effectively implemented, India needed architects such Mr Raza, who may have made a “reluctant” entry into this world by his own admission, but never proved to be a reluctant officer. His hugely entertaining autobiography demonstrates just that. Of Giants and Windmills tells it like it is, offers definitive management lessons without even trying to do so, all with strategically placed couplets thrown in.
 

Mr Raza’s experiences are as colourful and diverse as India. In his boyhood he had the good fortune to pick the brains of then vice president Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan on “World Government — Its Pros and Cons”, a topic of his intermediate English debate competition, and Nobel Prize-winner C V Raman.
 

Full of life, humour, and sheer storytelling, the incidents he describes in the book offer readers a picture of India’s contradictions, unchanging and transformed in equal measure. Forthright with his decisions — which he tried to ensure were made and executed within the bounds of the law — and crystal clear about his approach towards problem-solving, Mr Raza reflected the core socialist and democratic principles of early independent India.
 

Take caste- and religion-based discrimination, for example. Because of his surname, which “gave away” his religion, he braved the suspicions of almost everyone with whom he worked, but he made it a point to get the Dalits — who continue to be brutally marginalised — their due. The quality that distinguishes him from his peers then and officers now is that he didn’t do any of it sentimentally, for the emotional fulfilment or heroism that savarnas crave by “helping” others.  That is not to say that he eschewed humanitarianism in his personal life. Like his peers, he once invited his colleagues to a dinner party at his residence. One Valadre, from a traditional artisan caste, told him that no would turn up because he had been invited. Mr Raza paid no heed to this warning. Unsurprisingly, none of the “upper-caste” people turned up.
 

It must be incredibly hard to witness this sort of attitude or listen to comments such as “You don’t know, sir, it is not only the Muslims of Radhanpur. All Muslims of Gujarat, in fact, all Muslims of India, are dangerous” yet passionately turn up for work every day fully determined to help famine-impacted, flood-zoned, and poverty-stricken talukas and villages. But Mr Raza did, and he did it so spectacularly well that he eventually received due recognition, albeit belatedly. For his exceptional services, the Government of India awarded him the Padma Bhushan in 2010.
 

His Muslim identity meant his patriotism was often questioned. Now suspicions about Muslims are increasingly coagulating into outright hatred as exemplified by the demotion of the Babri Masjid. When an officer as celebrated and talented in managing riot-ridden areas as Mr Raza was deputed to Ayodhya the move was considered a “minority appeasing” decision.
 

Not that Mr Raza was worried about the consequences linked to his identity. He not only challenged several people who had connections with the chief minister, the chief ministers themselves, but once acted on behalf of a chief minister in the middle of the night, about which the man concerned learnt only from the morning papers.
 

Mr Raza notes that demolishing Babri Masjid was “an emotional symbol of the Hindutva ideology” — it was a declaration of the beginning of “establishing the Hindu Rashtra”. As much as many of us may feel disappointed to say it, the increasing possibility of just such a country is a reality India is facing — and the saddest part is that it doesn’t have enough Moosa Razas.

The reviewer is a Delhi-based writer. On Instagram/Twitter: @writerly_life