It is understandable that many Indians felt outraged about the UN inviting the UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi to address the general assembly to mark the adoption of the resolution to commemorate October 2 as the International Day of Non-Violence. This is also the celebration of the centenary of satyagraha.
With the UN address Sonia Gandhi has tried to establish her claim to represent India and the Mahatma, which is what perhaps her mentors and sympathisers are looking for.
For the international audience it is not of much significance as to who represents India. It took almost seven decades for even the Nobel Committee to acknowledge that it committed a mistake in not recognising the Mahatma for the Nobel. There has always been criticism of the political and racist criteria that often come into play in the awarding of these international recognitions. To that extent there is some weight in the belief shared by many Indians that the west is particularly pleased about promoting Sonia Gandhi on the Indian political scene.
To our mind, Sonia Gandhi is the least endowed to represent India in general and the Mahatma in particular. Her surname is an accident of her marrying into the Nehru family. Even this surname has nothing to do with the real Gandhi. There are Gandhians in India who were not only inspired by the great life of the Mahatma but who lived following in the footsteps of the great teacher. They have spent their entire life learning the teachings of the Mahatma. They in their own ways tried to emulate the great leader; they translated him into their own daily chores; they set up ashrams, service centres, served the less privileged living in the remote slums; they wrote and spoke to spread the message of the master, away from limelight and power play. Any one of them would have been more ideal to speak on satyagraha. But the UN did not choose them. They are not white, they are not backed by big players.
One of our columnists recently wrote that Sonia Gandhi is neither the head of the state nor has the stature to address the UN. Even we Indians are often at a loss to fathom her thoughts or understanding of the issues confronting the nation. This has never stood the scrutiny of the media. She has only been parroting what her speech-writers prepared for her for occasional public meetings. Was the invitation only a recognition of her Italian origins?
Indians in the US according to reports reaching us demonstrated against Sonia Gandhi addressing the UN on the Mahatma. In India, too, there were protests by some NGOs which largely went unreported for obvious reasons. The Congress chief in every sense is the opposite of the Mahatma. Only a couple of days before she was to land in New York to address the UN she promoted her son to take over the reins of her party. She treats the party as her jagir. The Mahatma on the other hand after winning freedom wanted the Congress to be dissolved. He refused to propose his own eldest son Hiralal, for a scholarship to study law in London.
The Mahatma insisted on the formation of a national government after independence. He lived to make Ramrajya on this earth. Sonia Gandhi and her allies like DMK and CPM are bent on erasing the name of Sri Ram from Indian history. She encouraged and appreciated M. Karunanidhi in his distasteful and blasphemous statements on Ram and Ramayana. As the BJP chief Rajnath Singh pointed out the ideals of the Mahatma are alien to the new dynastic Gandhis. Promoting such spurious images can hardly be termed a tribute to the great son of India.
