- There is also a small section in the Congress that believes Priyanka's visit was motivated by fears for her brother Rahul who will now be campaigning intensively across the country. Says a party insider: "She wants to end the legacy of blood and violence and by her kindness to Nalini she perhaps quietly wanted to send a message to the LTTE."__________________________
by Saba Naqvi Bhaumik
(April 20, Chennai, Sri Lanka Guardian) Grief and forgiveness. Rage and repentance. Tears and atonement. The meeting between Priyanka Gandhi Vadra and Nalini, one of her father's assassins, must have encompassed some of the strongest emotions of the human condition. It could have been the stuff of great world literature, maybe even a Dostoevsky novel in another time, were it not a riveting piece of contemporary news. So, immediately questions were raised: was this just an act of reconciliation by Priyanka or did she still have questions about her father's death?
The files are by no means closed on the matter. Seventeen years after Rajiv Gandhi was blown to bits by a suicide bomber in Sriperumbudur, Tamil Nadu, a group of low-level babus and clerical staff still draw their salaries for purportedly looking into conspiracy angles that led to his death. In fact, the MDMA or Multi Disciplinary Monitoring Agency was set up by the CBI in 1998 specifically to investigate the still unanswered questions about the "larger conspiracy" that led to Rajiv's killing and the financial links of the LTTE.
In a decade since, it has achieved nothing. Today, a visit to the MDMA office is an instructive lesson in how the bureaucracy can reduce national tragedy to farce. First, no one really knows where the MDMA office is anymore. When memories in the CBI are jogged, then an address pops up: the MDMA still survives in the Jamnagar House hutments, at the back of a crumbling Lutyens bungalow in central Delhi. The day after the story breaks that Priyanka is asking questions about her father's death, there is no one to give any answers at the MDMA.
A bored clerk says quite bluntly that no officer from the IPS or RAW is now attached to the agency. At times, a CBI official makes his way out here. But mostly the subsidiary staff bide time hanging around, pushing pen on paper, chatting, drinking tea. They say in a chorus: "There's no investigation going on here." What's more, it seems there was at least a pretence at running an investigation during the NDA rule. But since 2004, after the Congress came to power, they reveal that the MDMA exists only as a token presence. Perhaps, it survives because no one has the nerve to really close the file on such a sensitive case.
It's just that clearly Priyanka is still struggling to achieve closure on the brutal manner of her father's death. Reports say her first question to Nalini was: how and why did everything happen? Her visit to Vellore jail was a very private act. But she is a Gandhi and cannot escape the political consequences of her actions.
Political opponents like the BJP, always quick to hurl abuse at Sonia and Rahul, did not quite know how to react to Priyanka's action. "We don't know the meaning of this. What is she up to?" was the first reaction from BJP leaders. This was soon modified to "we do not comment on private matters". On the one hand, Priyanka's apparent act of pardon perhaps posed an ideological conundrum for the BJP, for it does not relate to gestures of forgiveness. The Sangh ideology propagates an eye for an eye philosophy and equates reconciliation with weakness. Yet, there was a realisation that Priyanka's gesture had gone down well with the public and media. Moreover, it was clear to the party and in fact the entire political class that the story was not deliberately leaked by the Gandhi family. For a change, the BJP kept silent on the actions of the dynasty.
Congressmen were delighted that "Priyanka came through looking so good and magnanimous".They are of course careful to say nothing on the record about the Nehru-Gandhi family. But sources close to the family and ministers were clear on one issue: this is no indicator to Priyanka entering politics when elections take place in 2009. Says a party leader: "This family hangs together and remains very close because of the terrible loss they have suffered. They have decided it is Rahul's turn." That the charismatic Priyanka is still there in the wings, perhaps ready to enter politics when her children are older, is nevertheless a reassuring thought for the Congress party.
But a senior party leader is categorical that "even fears of defeat in the polls will not force the hand of the Gandhi family or compel Priyanka to enter politics. After all, the leadership of the party remains a family preserve. And in politics there is always the next chance." As for any electoral gains from Priyanka's visit, the dynasty looks good and that is an intangible gain for the Congress.
There is also a small section in the Congress that believes Priyanka's visit was motivated by fears for her brother Rahul who will now be campaigning intensively across the country. Says a party insider: "She wants to end the legacy of blood and violence and by her kindness to Nalini she perhaps quietly wanted to send a message to the LTTE."
What is clear is that only a powerful emotion would have driven Priyanka to look into the face of a member of the assassination squad that killed her father. It would have required great inner strength to feel compassion for the guilty. Shorn of politics, it was a magnificent act in an age of mediocrity. For the dynasty that steered independent India's "tryst with destiny", this visit to a prison by a daughter seeking answers was a compelling moment of truth.
- Sri Lanka Guardian
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