I was astonished to see Sanjay Gandhi trending late last night and early today morning on Twitter. Of course, any damn thing can become a trending topic on Twitter, but this one highlighted how the shadow of Sanjay Gandhi still looms over Indian democracy and politics 35 years after his death in a fiery plane crash. If he were alive, the brash younger son of Indira Gandhi would have been 69 today. Many what if aficionados have already spun interesting scenarios of the shape of India if Sanjay Gandhi would have been alive today. There seems to be consensus that Sonia Gandhi would have remained a housewife and Rahul Gandhi would have been enjoying holidays in Bangkok or wherever without attracting derisive attention. India has certainly moved on and it is futile to indulge in what if scenarios except whipping up needless nostalgia. But the Sanjay Gandhi phenomenon goes way beyond interesting what if scenarios. He has left behind a legacy that still haunts and traumatizes India. No, I am not talking of the Emergency or forced sterilizations; though they matter a lot. I am talking about three distinct legacies that we continue to grapple with till this day.
The first legacy relates to the ascendance of dynasty politics. Till Sanjay Gandhi emerged as the de facto future of the Congress party in the early 1970s, dynasty politics in India was indeed there; but rarely practiced and visible. By anointing him as her successor, Indira Gandhi institutionalized the practice of dynasty politics. The disastrous effects of this are still being felt. It is ironical, for just a few years before anointing Sanjay Gandhi as her successor, Indira Gandhi had dealt a body blow to dynasties by abolishing the privy purse that was enjoyed by erstwhile rulers and their inheritors of princely states of the British raj. Today. Dynasty politics is a reality literally from Kashmir to Kanyakumari. In Kashmir, Omar Abdullah is a third generation dynast battling it out with a second generation dynast called Mehbooba Mufti Sayeed. In Tamil Nadu, the younger son of DMK leader M. Karunanidhi is gearing up to try and oust J. Jayalalitha from power. Except the Marxists, there is no other political formation that has been immune to the disease of dynasty. We all saw an extreme manifestation of this when Tejasvi Yadav, the younger son of Lalu Prasad Yadav, was sworn in as the deputy chief minister of Bihar. Prime Minister Narendra Modi often talks about the ill effects of dynasties. But he has failed to stop that infiltrating his party. Second generation dynasts are a common feature in the BJP, ranging from Jayant Sinha to Poonam Mahajan to Pankaja Munde to Anurag Thakur.
The second legacy that Sanjay Gandhi has left behind is that of politicians treating "public servants" as their personal servants. Till the 1970s, the Indian bureaucracy was sheltered to a large extent from the personal whims and fancies of politicians and diktats of ruling parties. Sanjay Gandhi destroyed all that at one stroke during the Emergency. Like many professional journalists, many professional bureaucrats preferred to crawl when they were asked to merely bend during the Emergency. Having tasted blood, politicians never let go of their power to "persuade" bureaucrats to do their bidding. Indira Gandhi and her sycophants coined a term for this" "committed" bureaucrats, media persons and even judges. The pliable ones were promoted while those who refused to "obey" were either shunted out or harassed in such a manner that a painful message was sent out loudly and clearly to Indian bureaucracy. When you read about the manner in which bureaucrats like Ashok Khemka, Durga Shakti Nagpal and Sanjeev Chaturvedi have been persecuted in recent times, don't forget to say thanks to Sanjay Gandhi and his legacy. Like dynasty politics, this cancer started with the Congress, but has spread to all political parties in India, including the Marxists.
The third malignant legacy left behind by Sanjay Gandhi is "thuggish" political behavior. Now, goons were a reality of Indian politics even before the country attained independence. Muscle power has been a reality of Indian elections since the first Lok Sabha elections of 1952. But Sanjay Gandhi and his associates made it mainstream. At a very "mild" level storm troopers like Kamal Nath, Jagdish Tytler and a host of other "leaders" led rowdy street demonstrations after Sanjay Gandhi and his mother lost power in the 1977 Lok Sabha elections. At the other extreme, two young "Congress workers" actually hijacked an Indian Airlines plane when Indira Gandhi was imprisoned in 1978. Till then, there used to be a whiff of distaste and contempt towards the thuggish behavior of political goons. Since the heydays of Sanjay Gandhi, it has become the cool thing to do. Today, even assemblies and the Parliament are no longer spared such behavior.
That's how dangerous the legacy left behind by Sanjay Gandhi has been. But before you lament the wounds inflicted by "dynasty politics" on India, take a deep breath and celebrate another "dynasty". Today happens to be the birth anniversary of Raj Kapoor, whose father Prithviraj Kapoor started the most durable Bollywood dynasties of India!
