In defence of Rajiv Gandhi

Book review of My Years with Rajiv: Triumph and Tragedy

Two Wajahat Habibullahs struggle to come out of this book. One is the courtly Shakespeare aficionado, writing in a self-deprecatory, slightly dated style. I mean, who uses words like “unbeknownst” and “anon” anymore? All that was missing was “tally ho” and “forsooth”. But the book is no less the charming for it. And the other is the terse bureaucrat, judicious with both words and judgments, relying on file notings as well as his own memory to shed new light on crucial events in Indian history and politics to which he was privy from his perch in the Prime Minister’s Office