New Delhi, Jul 15: “Humaare se ye galti hui, Sardar Patel ko prime minister banana chahiye tha aur Pandit Nehru ko president ,” Maulana Abul Kalam Azad told veteran journalist Kuldip Nayyar, a few years after he joined Nehru cabinet.
Kuldip Nayyar disclosed this during an exclusive interview with ‘The indian Express'. The interview revolved around the contents of his autobiography ‘Beyond the lines'.
Talking about emergency, Nayyar disclosed that Sanjay Gandhi was in no hurry to lift emergency and he wanted to continue with it for years to come.
Sanjay was of the opinion that with people like Bansi Lal , they could have ruled for another 25 years. Sanjay Gandhi blamed Indira Gandhi for lifting emergency and holding elections.
In his autobiography, Kuldeep Nayyar has mentioned a very interesting conversation he had with the then Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shashtri on 1962 war with China and the advice given to Pakistanis by the Shah of Iran.
Shashtri told Nayyar that Nehru had received a letter from the Shah of Iran which he had written to General Ayub of Pakistan telling him to fight alongside the Indian forces and drive out China.
Shashtri told Nayyar, “Nayyar Sahab, agar vo aa jaate yahan pe aur unka khoon humaare khoon ke saath behta, to Kashmir ye maangte to naa karma mushkil hota.”
Kuldip Nayyar also stood by the charges he leveled against P V Narasimha Rao for his dubious role in the destruction of Babri structure in Ayodhya. He went on to quote the biography of Arjun Singh in which he had also doubted the commitment of Rao in protecting the disputed structure.
Surprisingly, Kuldeep Nayyar, in his book, has come out in support of emergency despite the fact that he, himself, was jailed for three months.
Kuldip Nayyar defends his viewpoint, rather unconvincingly, by saying that he supports emergency not from personal viewpoint but from the country's viewpoint.
In a bizarre defence of his stand, Nayyar goes on to say that emergency would have helped India to become a nation dedicated to certain values, dedicated to the ethos of independence.
