2nd OCTOBER - THE SHADE WE HAVE BEEN LIVING IN AND WHY IT IS TIME TO RISE UP

 2nd October is celebrated nationwide as Gandhi Jayanti for the past 70 years. What the majority of the nation has forgotten to celebrate and remember is the birth of a stalwart of India's development, prosperity, and security.

Shri Lal Bahadur Shastri was born on 2nd October 1904, 35 years after Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi was born. Shastri Ji was an activist right from a young age and grew up in a society led by Gandhi and his followers towards an 'ahimsa way' of achieving freedom. It is indeed true that Shastri Ji was influenced by some of the principles of M.K. Gandhi and took to politics and freedom struggle due to the mesmerising speeches. 

In 1930, Shastri Ji formally became associated with the Congress Party and later became president of the Allahabad Congress Committee. After independence, Shastri ji served crucial roles under the Government of Jawaharlal Nehru. He served as the Minister of Railways, Minister of Transport and Communication, and Minister of Commerce and Industry. He was one of the firsts to recognise women empowerment by increasing the number of women employees in key industrial sectors during his term in the Cabinet.

On 9th June 1964, Shastri Ji became the 2nd Prime Minister of Bharat after the demise of the former Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru. At the time of his oath-taking, Bharat was in a very poor state due to the inefficient policy decisions undertaken by the former Prime Minister and the Congress party. 

Shastri Ji was very different from the individuals and ideologies of the Congress Party. He deeply cared about the development and prosperity of Bharat. He was calm as well as daring in his approach towards framing policies so as to make Bharat progressive. 

He was instrumental in tackling some of the major problems in Bharat such as food shortage, the zamindari system, unemployment, and poverty. He was the man behind the Green Revolution which was the stepping stone in reforming the agricultural sector in Bharat. He considered farmers to be the backbone of Bharat. He was influenced by M.K. Gandhi but he did not blindly follow his principles. In 1965 when Pakistan attacked Bharat, Shastri Ji immediately sent the Bharatian soldiers to counter-strike the Pakistani soldiers and gave them a reply in their own language.

This is the reason why Shastri Ji stated 'JAI JAWAN JAI KISAN ' which means that both the soldiers as well as farmers are important for nation-building. He undertook immense reforms in the defense sector as well as the agricultural sector. Many may credit Rajiv Gandhi for implementing the White Revolution but in reality, it was Shastri Ji who lay the foundations for the White Revolution in Bharat during the droughts of 1965-66 by implementing long-term plans to overcome this food shortage. He requested the entire country to give up on one meal a week so that other families, who could not even afford one meal a day be able to afford it, and surprisingly the entire nation followed his words. 

When the entire nation was thanking Shastri Ji for being such a wonderful leader, party politics were at play as the Congress Party which was then being led by Indira Gandhi did not approve of the dynamic steps taken by Shastri Ji towards nation-building.

In 1965, the bold decisions of Shri Lal Bahadur Shastri led the Bharatian army to enter Pakistan and capture West Pakistan territories including Balochistan. This shocked the entire world as no one considered Bharat to have such military powers. The UN intervened and held a peace treaty at Tashkent to sign an agreement that stated that both Pakistan and Bharat would go back to the position they held previously. Unfortunately, the day after the signing of the agreement, Lal Bahadur Shastri passed away in his room. It was reported that he suffered from a massive cardiac arrest and that there was no foul play. The Indian Congress party considered it not necessary to conduct any investigation and Indira Gandhi was very confident that the death was due to natural reasons.

However, there exist various contradicting facts which tell otherwise. One such theory which has been framed by renowned researchers is that the Congress Party in collaboration with the KGB in Russia poisoned Shastri Ji when he was in Tashkent. However, I am not here to verify if this theory is true or false, as it is based on speculation which I quite frankly cannot comment upon since I  do not possess any primary knowledge regarding the same.

All I am here is to inform the audience of a great man who was indeed instrumental for the overall development of the nation. I am here to ask the audience to look at history in a different approach than what was taught to us in our textbooks. I am here to initiate discussions on whose birth anniversary must be widely celebrated, a man who acquired the term 'Mahatma' who was a hypocrite in many ways, or to a man who was the definition of nation-building and development. I hope I initiate discussions in this aspect. I feel the time has come to update our calendars and insert Lal Bahadur Shastri Jayanthi on the 2nd of October.  

 

Well, for some of you the comments I have made regarding certain individuals in this article may be belittling and ungrateful to the history you know of but these comments have been made on factual grounds and on basis of the love and respect I possess towards Shastri Ji. The comments made do not intend in any way to defame any individual and have been solely written for the purpose of literature and readership. I do not intend to personalise any comment made towards any individual in the above article. This article has been written by me as a learner and nothing more. To be honest, I did not know much about Lal Bahadur Shastri up until 2018 and was blinded by the Gandhi Jayanthisim on 2nd October. I did my reading on Shastri Ji and the Thaskent files and learnt about what seemed to me as the real truth. With this, I end my article.

Thank you for being a patient reader and reaching the end of this piece. Do drop in your comments regarding what I have written and I would be happy to engage in meaningful discussions with you. Also, suggest some topics which I could explore and write upon in the coming weeks. Stay safe, take care, and get vaccinated. 

Note - The author does not take credit for any of the pictures used in the above article and all rights lie with the respective sources linked to the photos.