A LIFE IN DIPLOMACY By M. Rasgotra, Viking, Rs 699
Maharajakrishna Rasgotra relates an amusing incident during his tenure as Indian High Commissioner to Britain: he and his wife were guests in the Royal box at Ascot, eliciting from the society magazine, Tatler, a reference to the presence of the 'maharaja and maharani of Rasgotra'. Our maharaja has produced a sumptuous memoir of his years in the ministry of external affairs, from third secretary in his first foreign posting in Washington to his last as Indian High Commissioner in London. Betwixt and between, he was foreign secretary. His book is gilded with reflections on Indian foreign policy from its inception to its flowering, and of the men and women who shouldered its responsibilities.
Born into a family of Dogra Brahmins of modest means, he went to a village school, before spreading his wings in the urban settings of Punjab, learning English and teaching the subject to undergraduates. It was India's Time of Trouble: Independence loomed, as did the holocaust of Partition. Having taken the civil service examination and entered the ministry of external affairs, the neophyte cut his teeth in Delhi before setting out for a probationer's course at Wadham College in Oxford. There he sharpened his analytical tools studying history and international relations, thence to Sorbonne in Paris, followed by a pleasurable stay with a French family in Tours, perfecting his language skills.
Rasgotra's first foreign posting to Washington coincided with Jawaharlal Nehru's inaugural visit to the United States of America. With the Cold War at its zenith, the chemistry between the Indian guest and his hosts was poor. With the McCarthyist inquisition soon to unfold, anti-Soviet emotions were running high. The American leadership paid little heed to India's manifold problems and frowned disapprovingly at the country's decision to stay clear of the emergent power blocs. Third secretary Rasgotra was not to know that a US state department desk officer, in a minute, castigated Nehru for his 'inflexible attitude with regard to Kashmir,' perceiving 'national traits which in time, if not controlled, could make India Japan's successor in Asiatic imperialism. In such a circumstance, a strong Muslim block under the leadership of Pakistan and friendly to the US might afford a desirable balance of power in Asia'. It was a Faustian pact that would snare both parties in an uncomfortable embrace, vitiating Indo-US relations for a generation and more. That said, Rasgotra and Nehru contrasted the warmth of the public welcome to the unsympathetic attitude of the leadership. This left the prime minister wondering. The young diplomat escort put him straight - it was the arrogance of economic and military power he was witnessing. Not blindsided by these and other warts, such as the nation's embedded white racism, the novice diplomat marvelled at the country's manifold achievements, the energy and inventiveness of American business enterprise, and the nation's seminal advances in science and technology.
If Indian complaints about American policy had justification, so had US irritation with India's protests at the Japanese peace treaty and the Korean conflict et al where no Indian interests were at stake, avers the author correctly.
In the wake of the Sino-Indian war of 1962, President John F. Kennedy offered to help India in producing the nuclear bomb. Nehru consulted Homi Bhabha from among a select circle. Bhabha responded with enthusiasm. But certain high officials of the foreign office demurred. This gelled with the prime minister's instincts. The offer was unwisely rejected, says the author.
His analysis of Chinese aggrandizement, the rape of Tibet and the disingenuous 'One Belt, One Road' project is scornfully dismissive. Sino-Indian ties, he avers, cooled with the Dalai Lama's flight to India and his continuing presence on Indian soil. Mawkish sentimentality on China was based on ignorance of the country's history and historical traditions. 'Better to parley with colonial France, than sniff Chinese dung all one's life', was Ho Chi Minh's reported advice to his colleagues in Hanoi, following the locust-like invasion of Vietnam by Chiang Kai-shek's hordes.
Rasgotra's chapters on Nepal are scorching and masterful - Bismarck's mailed fist beneath Talleyrand's velvet glove. As ambassador in Kathmandu during Sikkim's accession to India, he was never reluctant to mince words with Nepalese politicians and officials, directing his verbal punches with telling accuracy and force.
He was in top form during the Bangladesh crisis. He appeared on American television to put the record straight. When a junior official of the state department sought to warn him that measures were afoot to declare him persona non grata, his response was memorable. In that case, he replied, he would return home to India a hero, enter politics, stand for Parliament and join the cabinet. The rapier thrust went home unanswered.
Rasgotra's time in Britain is deftly narrated. The British with their self-deprecating humour responded uproariously when at a Tory conference a lady head of a town council was repeatedly referred to as mayor. A woman, he told his audience "should be respected and admired as such... without imagining her as a man, or worse, making a man out of her!". Finally, "Madam Mayor, I hope and pray that the effects of the transmogrification practised on you are not irreversible."
Junior minister, Margaret Thatcher, visited India on Rasgotra's suggestion. Indira Gandhi and her visitor got on famously. As prime minister, Mrs Thatcher expunged the Khalistani presence in her party.
Rasgotra's judgment of situations was usually unerring. While Indian negotiators at the Shimla conference with a defeated Pakistan traded territory for the return of Pakistani prisoners, he argued strongly that feeding 90,000 prisoners of war would be a strain on the public purse. Holding on to captured land would be a more rewarding collateral. He lost the argument and India lost the peace. I would suggest that, if Jinnah was the subcontinent's Count Dracula, Zulfiker Ali Bhutto was surely its Mussolini. The Pakistani Duce's well rehearsed stagecraft concealed the sham for a while, but it led eventually to the gallows.
Rasgotra's deepest affection and admiration are reserved for Nehru and Indira Gandhi, especially for her diplomatic skills and unyielding resolve to defend national interest. She supported him unflinchingly when he sought to normalize Indo-US ties in response to the American president, Ronald Reagan's overtures, following the bleak Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger years.
When asked by the Soviet leader, Leonid Brezhnev, what he should do to surmount the purgatory of Afghanistan, she advised a declaration of victory and an immediate withdrawal from the country. Radicalized Islam, aided and abetted by the West, Saudi Arabia and China would be a destabilizing force for the region and beyond, she had warned presciently.
Rasgotra states unequivocally that there must be no diminution in the strength of India's time-tested relationship with Russia. Which other country would have leased India a nuclear submarine and help build its own? He asks pointedly. The possible subtext being the volatility of American politics. Shortly after the George W. Bush administration was ensconced in office in January 2001, defence secretary, Donald Rumsfeld denounced India "as a menace to other peoples, including the US, Western Europe and the countries of Western Asia" (Le Monde diplomatique, September 2009). Chilled silence was Delhi's response.
The author and his wife, Kadambari, to whom he makes a moving dedication, bore stoically the untimely death of their eldest son in a tragic accident, who was a mere boy at that time, .
Maharajakrishna Rasgotra is the foremost Indian diplomat of his generation, fit to rank with the world's best. His unrivalled experience is the essential article of a diplomat's portmanteau. His book is one to savour and every page and line a delight.
