When Rajiv couldn’t contact Thatcher

K. Natwar Singh

On March 21, 1990, South West Africa dropped off the map of Africa. Namibia was born and Sam Nujoma became its President.

Rajiv Gandhi and I arrived in Windhock a day earlier. Rajiv was no longer Prime Minister but he was treated as such by President Nujoma. We had provided humanitarian help to Nujoma's party, South West Africa People’s Organisation (SWAPO), for decades.

As we did not recognise the racist government of South Africa, we could not go to Windhock through South Africa. I telephoned President Ken Kaunda of Zambia (whom I had known intimately since the early 1960s). I placed before him our dilemma. His immediate response was, “Rajiv and you come to Lusaka (the capital of Zambia) and we will fly to Windhock in my plane.”

On our way back from the Namibian capital, Rajiv Gandhi and I flew to London in Tiny Rowland’s private jet. Who was Tiny Rowland? He was a very wealthy swashbuckling British adventurer with a vast business empire in several Southern African countries. He openly helped these countries in their struggle for independence. Tiny was an uninhibited raconteur. We said goodbye to him at the London airport to catch an Air India flight to India, after two and a half hours.

Rajiv wished to speak to Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher on the telephone. Salman Haider, the Deputy High Commissioner, failed to get her. Rajiv next spoke to Labour Party leader Kinnock, who was in Dublin. He promptly answered Rajiv’s call.

Some months later, a mutual friend informed me of Mrs Thatcher's reaction to Rajiv not contacting her on his way back to India. This I found strange. On July 15, 1990, I wrote to the British Prime Minister from St. Jame’s Court Hotel, London:

Dear Prime Minister, I am loath to add more paper to your desk. I deem it necessary to clear a misunderstanding. This is about Mr. Rajiv Gandhi's brief stopover in London, on March 24, 1990.

A mutual friend informed me that you are surprised and distressed at Rajiv Gandhi not contacting you while he was here in March. I was with Mr. Gandhi. Here are the facts.

We arrived in London at around 8 am from Lusaka. On reaching the airport Mr. Gandhi expressed a desire to speak to you on the telephone. Salma Haider, Deputy High Commissioner, who had received us, telephoned No 10. The answer he got was that you were out of London and not reachable. I thought it very odd and asked who was attached to Mr. Gandhi. If he on his network could contact someone on his security staff, so that Mr. Gandhi could speak to you. His very polite answer was that he could not do so. That was that. 

I might add that when we contacted Mr Kinnock, we had more success. His office said he was in Dublin but they would pass the message to him. They did. Mr Kinnock called Mr. Gandhi from Dublin before we left London. We were at London airport for only two and half hours.

This letter needs no acknowledgment.

I just wanted to put on record straight, because Mr. Gandhi and I hold you in high esteem. With good wishes, yours sincerely, K. Natwar Singh, The Hon’ble Mrs Margret Thatcher, 10 Downing Street, London.

After a few days we got a wishy-washy reply from 10 Downing Street.

Sitaram Yachuri will be missed in the Rajya Sabha. Perhaps the best debater, he never used to read from a text. He was fluent in English, Hindi and Urdu. He is a committed Communist but never shallow or garrulous. Endowed with a striking personality, he is excellent company. He is immune from banalities, a bane of our political life.

I have been reading George Kennan's “Around the Cragged Hill”. Kennan was an outstanding diplomat, historian, scholar, thinker and author. He died in 2005 at the age of 101 in Princeton.

Marxism is now out of date. Only two countries follow diluted communism, China and Cuba. Kennan writes about the 'theoretical approach to social problems. Marxism is general or at least a part of it — has deeply influenced the thinking of millions of people world-wide. And the particular feature of Marxism that has had the widest and deepest effect has been the implicit egalitarianism ….” Now that I am on Marx, let me quote Ernest Gellner in, Eric Hobsbawm's book, “On History”. 

 “Whether or not people positively believe in the Marxist scheme, no coherent, well-articulated rival pattern has emerged … in other words, no serious discussion of history is possible which does not refer back to Marx…”