‘‘There is complete leadership vacuum’’

BORN in 1914 to a traditional Tamil family, Laxmi Sehgal did her medicine from Madras Medical College and migrated to Singapore for a career as a doctor. But fate had other ideas. In 1941, the Japanese invaded Singapore and the British who ruled the island surrendered unconditionally. Over 90,000 people were taken prisoners by Japanese of which more than half were Indians. It was these POWs who formed the bulk of the INA under the leadership of Subhas Chandra Bose which finally went to war against the British Empire.

One of the first regiments of INA was formed at Waterloo Street in Singapore and it was called the Rani Jhansi Regiment. Laxmi Sehgal was asked to lead it with Netaji telling her to become the new Jhansi ki Rani. And that’s what she proved to be.

The INA started its march to India to fight for independence. From Singapore, it moved to Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia and then to Mamyo where a large Indian settlement helped the INA. It was here that Netaji received the news about INA’s reverses in Imphal and realised that his dream of reaching Delhi would not be a cakewalk. He moved from Mamyo and Laxmi Sehgal went into hiding at the picturesque Inle Lake in the Shan Hills where she was ultimately taken as a prisoner of war by the British.

"Though we lost the war," reminisces Laxmi Sehgal," Netaji proved that Indians were all united despite different languages, cultures and identities. He was able to inspire everybody and made us feel that we were Indians first and everything else later.

Today even at the age of 85, Captain Laxmi Sehgal is a practising doctor in Kanpur. A highly respected person, she is usually the star attraction at major seminars on Independence and after. Though India did achieve Independence, she says, the events which have overtaken the country have pained her immensely. In a frank talk with Saikat Neogi, she blames it on the increasing political vacuum in the country.

‘‘You say that we are on the threshold of a new millennium. But I don’t see it anywhere. It would appear that instead of going into the 21st century, India is actually regressing into the 19th century.

Look what happened in a remote Uttar Pradesh village sometime back. A woman committed suicide on her husband’s funeral pyre and the villagers began calling her sati and wanted to build a temple in that place. Isn’t this travelling back in time. An evil which was banned over a century ago, is still being glorified in some parts of India.

And what about child marriage? What has our government done about it? Yes, on paper the practice is banned, but has it stopped? Only the other day there was a front-page picture of two minor children being married off in Kishangarh in Rajasthan. Has anyone been taken to task for this? I doubt it. And why only Kishangarh? Go to some remote villages in Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh and see how it is thriving.

The other day in Uttar Pradesh there was a case of a father molesting his own daughter. The incident would have gone unnoticed had the mother not reported it to the police. And there are plenty of such cases which go unreported. Our government has done nothing to stop this heinous practice.

The cases of dowry, bride burning and other social evils are too many to recount. In a matter of social reforms, our policy-makers have failed to destroy the feudal and obscurantist ideas of our society with the result that such evils like sati-pratha, child marriage, communal intolerance and inhuman atrocities against women, minorities and Dalits continue unabated.

So why should we be beating drums about the arrival of the new millennium? Does it have any meaning for millions of Indians who are still deprived of basic human needs?

What does the millennium mean to the people of Uttarkashi, Gujarat and Orissa? Did we learn from those natural calamities, did we frame a disaster management strategy our government so fervently talked about? If we had, the Orissa tragedy would have been effectively dealt with and considerably reduced.

But instead look what’s happening. Not just in Orissa but the entire country. There are many villages which have not even been visited by a petty government officer in the past 50 years, leave apart ministers and senior bureaucrats. People in such villages are deprived of basic amenities such as food and water, primary health and education. But does anyone care?

Economic slavery

How can such things happen in this century? After all these years people like me who fought for Independence feel that the only thing we did on August 15, 1947, was to pull down the Union Jack and unfurl the Indian Flag. But Independence never came in its true spirit and meaning. We never endeavoured for social and economic independence. Now we are into a bigger trap of multinational companies who are just dumping their products and making us their economic slaves.

The so-called liberalisation, I feel, unabashedly favours multinationals. Instead of the core sector like steel and power plants and scientific expertise to build our industries, all we have got from the developed countries are colas, burgers, pizzas and denim jeans.

Even the process of hasty mechanisation has had a very negative effect on people. Look at Kanpur, where I stay. It was one of the biggest industrial cities of India. Today many mills are closed and thousands of people are out of jobs.

Such thoughtless mechanisation causes a great harm to society and builds up pressures. Once people lose their jobs they take their children out of school and make them into child labourers. Since they have no money to attend to their medical needs, diseases becomes prevalent in areas they live in. Joblessness gives rise to crime and other social evils. And deprived of education, the young people cannot distinguish good from bad.

Our education system is in a pitiable situation. There are no proper educational guidelines. Many villages still don’t have schools and our drop-out rate must be among the highest in the world. The Adult Literacy Mission has flopped. So have many other government-sponsored programmes and thousands of crores have been spent wastefully on them.

Is that what Subhas Chandra Bose, Mahatma Gandhi and other leaders of pre-Independent India fought for? Not just them, even common people like me and my family had so much spirit in us, so much commitment which is missing in the Indians today. That’s because today there are no leaders of stature to look up to. India is bereft of idols. There are thousands of politicians but no inspirational leader who can galvanise the masses positively. India has lost its vision.

In 1920 when Mahatma Gandhi embarked upon his Non-Cooperation Movement, I was just around six years old. But my mother was enthused by it and took part in the movement, addressing rallies all over the town. That’s when I saw the Indian leaders like Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru at close quarters.

Later when I grew up, many leaders wanted me to actively take part in the movement. I wanted to complete my studies first and then do something for my country. A career was very important in my scheme of things because only then could I meaningfully help India in the restructuring process after Independence.

Singapore sojourn

In 1938, I graduated from Madras Medical College as a doctor. That’s when a relative in Singapore fell sick and wanted me to come and attend to him. In Singapore I came in touch with many Indian doctors settled there. I too decided to stay there and set up my own practice and soon I was doing very well.

In 1941, the Japanese invaded Singapore and my family insisted that I return to India. But by now I was getting involved in political developments. The British surrendered unconditionally and over 90,000 men were taken prisoners by the Japanese of which more than half were Indian soldiers. It was these POWs who formed the bulk of the INA which finally went to war against the British Empire under the leadership of Subhas Chandra Bose or Netaji as he was more popularly known.

But he was certainly not the kind of ‘Netajis’ we have today. Bose was ready to die for his country and did not believe in any form of compromise on essential matters.

Though we lost our war, Netaji proved that Indians were all united despite their different languages, cultures and identities. He was able to inspire everybody and made us feel that we were Indians first and everything else later.

That is what’s essentially missing today. We have lost our national identity. We are not united anymore and are ready to fight for all the wrong reasons. There’s a complete leadership vacuum.

We need another Subhas Chandra Bose who can once again make India one and usher in unity amidst diversity in its true spirit. Our tragedy as a nation will not end till those in power realise that our future depends only on the complete unity of our people, irrespective of caste, creed and gender, giving equal opportunity to all and actively encouraging a spirit of tolerance which is the ultimate value of the Indian people.

During the pre-Independence period, freedom from the British rule was the main motivation of Indian people. Previous invaders of the country had imbibed a lot from the Indian culture and also enriched it with their own, specially in the fields of arts, agriculture, flora and fauna. But the English came with the conviction that they were a superior race and Indian people were only fit to be their slaves. It was this factor that motivated Indians to unite and fight against them.

The British also came to the conclusion that the only way they could rule the country was by driving a wedge between the Hindus and Muslims so that they would be busy fighting each other, leaving the British to freely impose their rule.

World War 1 was a turning point in the history of the country. During the war people stood behind the British Government, helping it with man-power, productivity and money. When the war was over, there was great hope that there would be a sharing of power but instead came the massacre of innocent people in Jallianwala Bagh in Punjab, the brutal suppression of the Moplah rebellion, an agrarian uprising in Malabar, and other repressive measures throughout the country.

This led to the revolutionary movement in Bengal and finally with the arrival of Mahatma Gandhi on the political horizon, a broad-based awakening of the masses against foreign rulers. Unfortunately, the movement could not be carried to its logical conclusion and a final break with caste and communalism was not made.

The cost of freedom

The British were quick to realise this and planned the partition of the country, further sowing the seeds of mistrust and dissension between the two communities. The unseemly haste with which they thrust Partition and granted Independence to the two sides speaks volumes of their intent. Unfortunately our Indian leaders did not or would not realise their wily game and accepted the division leading to unnecessary loss of innocent lives.

It was freedom at a heavy cost. The leaders of that time never calculated that Partition would be forced upon us and so many innocent people would be massacred, homes would be plundered, women raped and children killed.

Once we went and met Pandit Nehru and asked him why he accepted the partition of the country. He replied. "So that there should not be any Hindu-Muslim riots in India". Tell me, how are we better now? We have had many riots ever since Independence. And there seems to be no control. We will be slaves till we can shake off these communal attitudes.

The worst thing is we are now allowing foreigners to enslave us economically. The conglomerates are serving the vested interests of a few rich businessmen and politicians. Today the big companies are spreading their tentacles, tomorrow they will be interfering in every decision-making process of the country. Just like the British rule in India which had its root in the East India Company.

If this is not stopped, our economy will soon be controlled by foreigners. They will be dictating our annual national budget. That will be the ultimate disaster. In the 20th century we were slaves to the British. I hope we don’t become economic slaves to the West in the 21st century’’. — NF