Rani Singh thinks aam in aam admi refers to mangoes, and translates the phrase as “the skinny basket-carrying mango man”. She tells us that Rajiv Gandhi was “violently assassinated”. The Babri Masjid’s demolition is “carnage”. But despite howlers in two languages, she is to be complimented on her extensive homework and for sifting out, collating and highlighting nuggets of information that may have been well-known already but whose contextual presentation in 29 refreshingly brisk chapters recreates one of the most extraordinary personages of our time.
Though Singh does so without recourse to archives or access to any of the principal players, including her heroine, I learnt a lot from what she says, what she implies, and what she is careful not to say. Yet, I have a feeling this book will not be judged on merit. Most readers will respond in the light of their attitude to its subject. Henry Kissinger’s eulogy on the jacket as well as some sour reviews in this country bear that out.
That is largely because the subject so completely overshadows the author and her labours. Sonia Gandhi’s achievement is unique in modern history. As Singh sums up, “The little girl who grew up in a protective family and the loving shelter of the Salesian sisterhood in a small town is now leading the coalition running a country of more than a billion people, halfway around the world from her place of birth.” Catherine the Great, who was born a petty German princess but ruled the Rsussia she married into with an iron hand for 34 years, offers the closest parallel. Many similarities can be cited but there are probably also many more differences. Catherine spanned a much shorter distance. Her two neighbouring nations were both European and Christian. The transition was far less drastic.
Not that Singh is alive to any historical resonance; her work bears the unmistakable stamp of Delhi’s chattering classes. This is especially true of the first five of the six parts into which the book is divided. The forward-looking seven chapters of the last section attempt quite sensibly to analyse the general political scene and Rahul Gandhi’s style and prospects, and suffer less from the breathlessly fawning style of the personal passages. But the trivia (like Sonia’s weighty decision in choosing coconut water over papaya, lime, orange and fresh mango juice) becomes tiresome. So does Singh’s habit of trotting out the person’s full credentials each time she cites a source.
The relatively few Indians who take an interest in political biographies in English have exacting standards. Amateurish generalisations (“Unlike many older democracies, in India, politics is physical and emotional”) and misleading simplifications (calling The Last Post “the Commonwealth homage to those fallen in war”) suggest the book isn’t for them. It will appeal to middle and lower middle class Western housewives who drool over gooey Woman’s Own stories. The absence of objectivity evident in references to unnamed Congressmen who didn’t rush to pay court to Sonia as “sharks”, “vultures” and “scheming” won’t bother them. Reading the book as a tale of love, sacrifice and triumph – and it is undeniably all three – they won’t even notice the political nuances.
Whether Singh herself is fully aware of them is another matter. But the woman she paints emerges as an ambitious and highly skilful strategist whose “socialist” (for want of a better word) utterances (“We cannot spend our way to prosperity”) are a tactical foil to the Prime Minister’s free-market commitment. We gather that Sonia and not Indira Gandhi was responsible for drumming Maneka Gandhi out of the house: the senior Mrs Gandhi would have made her younger daughter-in-law her personal secretary (a prized political insider’s position) if Sonia hadn’t “objected emphatically”. The parallels of the Bhuj and Belchi pilgrimages confirm how closely Sonia modelled her political style on her mother-in-law’s.
The renaming of Jawahar Bhavan after Rajiv and the setting up of the Rajiv Gandhi Foundation and Rajiv Gandhi Institute of Contemporary Studies within a month of the Sriperumbudur tragedy gave the lie to reports of a grieving widow reluctantly dragged out of seclusion. In Singh’s version, Sonia wasted no time setting up a parallel centre of power and a platform from which she could issue oblique statements on public issues, sometimes contrary to the Congress government of the day. Singh also tells us she is projecting Rahul for the same reason that Indira Gandhi built up Sanjay: Sonia trusts no one and confides only in her son and daughter. Singh calls them the “troika”.
The absence of any mention of Robert Vadra’s position vis-à-vis the troika isn’t the only omission. The mystery of Sonia’s “inner voice” and her relationship with Manmohan Singh deserve scrutiny. Singh’s insights would have been better received if she had tempered paeans of praise for Sonia’s undoubted concern for the underprivileged with some mention of people and events that once convulsed the nation and whose rumblings can still be heard. Singh skims over the Bofors affair and doesn’t even mention the Shah Bano case or Ottavio Quattrocchi. A credible biographer must lay those ghosts if only to clear the Gandhi name.
SONIA GANDHI: AN EXTRAORDINARY LIFE, AN INDIAN DESTINY
Rani Singh
Palgrave Macmillan; Rs 499
