'RULER OF 600 MILLION - - AND ALONE,' BY CLAIRE STERLING, NEW YORK TIMES MAGAZINE, 10 AUGUST 1975

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP79-01194A000100310001-1
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: C
• Document Page Count: 6
• Document Creation Date: November 11, 2016
• Document Release Date: August 6, 1998
• Sequence Number: 1
• Publication Date: August 18, 1975
• Content Type: REPORT

TIAL
Approved For Release 1999/09/02 : CIA-R
"Ruler of 600 Million -- and Alone," by Claire Sterling,
New York Times Magazine, 10 August 1975
The attached article provides background information on the current
situation in India -- especially relevant since the recent military coup
in neighboring Bangladesh overthrowing Mujibur Rahman who, like Indira
Gandhi, had become increasingly autocratic.
Widespread corruption, neglect of agricultural needs, and four years
of drought contributed to the popular unrest which precipitated India's
state of emergency. In Sterling's view these problems, combined with
Gandhi's sense of mission, ruthless political acumen, and sheer tenacity,
suggest a dangerous future for India: "the dynamics of staying on top
may well push (Gandhi) into becoming a real dictator." More importantly,
Gandhi's increasing dependence on pro-Moscow communists, her only source
of support outside the enfeebled Congress Party, could move India into
the Soviet orbit in Sterling's view.'
The army remains the one group capable of stopping India's develop-
ment into a police state. Traditionally apolitical and loyal to the
state, it may one day intervene "to restore the institutions it has been
drilled into defending since birth." The attached, for your background
reading only, is intended to alert field personnel to a potentially
volatile situation.
This issuance contains articles from domestic and foreign
publications selected for field operational use. Recipients are
cautioned that most of this material is copyrighted. For repub-
lication in areas where copyright infringement may cause prob-
lems payment of copyright fees not to exceed $50.00 is authorized
per previous instructions. The attachment is unclassified when
detached.
ease 1999/09/02 : CIA-RDP79-01194A000100310001-1
 Approved For Release 1999/09/02 : CIA-RDP79-01194A000100310001-1
CPYRGHT
Ruler of 600 million-
CPYRGHT
a~d~lone
Indira Gandhi is unmaking a democracy
`to save it' and looking to-exchange moral authority for bread.
By Claire Sterling
The news, flashed from New Delhi last June 12,
made stunning headlines around the globe. Indira
Gandhi, Prime Minister of what was then the
world's biggest democracy - India has neatly 600
million people, a seventh of the human race - had
been found guilty of corrupt electoral practices by
the High Court of Allahabad, and would have to
step down.
She didn't 'step down,. and India isn't exactly a
democracy any more. -
Indeed, Mrs. Gandhi didn't even wait for - the
Supreme Court -to hear and rule on her. appeal
before arresting upwards of'3,000 people, including
all major opposition leaders and 30 or 40 from her
own Congress, party (but notthe pro-Moscow Com-
munists, who praised her. "firm a_ ction" as "long
overdue"); imposing rigid press censorship;- sus-
pending constitutional rights, and proclaiming, on
June 26, a state of emergency giving her full dicta-
torial powers. "There is a higher court than the
High Courts and Indira Gandhi is not a mere Prime
Minister," said a newspaper close to her.
She herself claimed she did it "to save democ-
racy," and hoped the emergency would "not last'
long." But the clockwork precision of her crack-
down suggests that. it must have been planned well
in advance; and it seems- plain from her brutal
performance that her countrymen are going to have
to put up a stiff fight for their freedom if they
want it back again.
There was supreme irony in the verdict of that
upright judge in Allahabad who brought the crisis
to a head. Of all the opposition charges hurled
against Mrs. Gandhi, accused among.other things
of. turning India into a sink of corruption, the -
charge that finally tripped her up was simply that
she had used somebody on the Government payroll
to manage her election campaign. When she did
that, in 1971, -she needn't have bothered. At that.
dazzling. zenith of her career, she could have
romped home in any election without help from
anyone. Not now, though. Her decline from popular
grace began long before the Allahabad court
ordered her to resign. If she has dumped consti-
tutional government rather than obey the order,
it isn't because she was "indispensable to India,"
as her Congress party, claimed, but because too
0ftbcf'B~Ft1?aseJ9I 6"T
/: Cl
The fact is that Mrs. Gandhi had a chance rarely
iven to any national leader in our time to change
he face, of her immense, tormented, poverty-
tricken country, and she muffed it. In the train
f her failure, the demoralization spreading across
dia has been so profound that.it is hopeless to
ttribute it to any single cause. Drought, floods,
amine, starvation, punishing inflation, economic
gnation, black marketing, colossal corruption
nd "one of the most dramatic erosions in living
tandards ever experienced," as The Economist of
ondon called it, have been part of it, but not all.
That has made the whole bigger than its parts has
'en a "collapse of moral authority," according to
distinguished Indian editor, George Veerghese-"a
allure of leadership that has bred cynicism, frus-
ration, indiscipline, anger, violence, visible signs of
isintegration and enveloping chaos."
These are strong words from a man who had
ong been at Mrs. Gandhi's side as press counselor
nd personal friend. Yet, traveling around the
untry not long before the crisis broke, I found
them borne out at every turn. From Bombay in.
iie west to Calcutta in the east. from Trivandrum
in the south to the "rice bowl" of Madhya Pradesh
and the "breadbasket" of the Punjab in the north,
I heard nothing but bitter 'complaints. Gujarat,
where Mrs. Gandhi's Congress Party took a calami-
tous beating _ in local elections on the very day? of
her court conviction, had been paralyzed through-
out the previous year by strikes, sit-ins and popu-
lar demonstrations against rocketing food costs
and blatant graft in high places. Bombay, when I
was there, was averaging 24 mass public,protests
a day. Calcutta, where one in every five people cad
find no work at all, was more mutinous still. Bihar's
jails were literally overflowing (into schools, parks,
zoos) with. 70,000 political prisoners. About half
were left-wing Naxalite terrorists; the rest were
peaceful followers of Mrs. Gandhi's implacable ad-
versary, Jaya_Prakasl Narayan, a saintly 72-year-
old intellectual who in recent years had become
the principal articulator of the country's despera-
tion and the first real threat to Mrs. Gandhi's power.
Claire Sterling, who *writes for The Atlantic
Monthly, The Washington Post and The Interna-
tional Herald Tribune, returned recently from India.
T9=0000100310001-1
 ,,... ? Ann ed For UL e~se,1.999L09/.02-: CIA-RDP79-01194A000100310001-1CPYRGHT
tl91?. Le'eer
-Q&_ bunrcelv e to cling n, a
ianeu. inucn or the unrest in her. Much later, after her long-accustomed majority in
India is the product of three beloved mother's death of the Parliament. In 1969, three
years of relentless, catastrophic tuberculosis in Switzerland, years after she became Prime
draught. But there is nothing 'Indira said, "I saw her being Minister, she even seemed
supernatural 'about the forces ! hurt, and I was determined complaisant when the party
of corruption that have emp- not to be hurt." bosses moved to displace her.
tied the shelves of the Gov Mother and daughter often They earmarked for the of-
ernment's Fair Price Shops prayed together, and to this - fice of president a man
(at which food and household day Indira reveres holy men. opposed to Indira Gandhi,
essentials are rationed at and frequents shrines, though clearly planning to have him
fixed official prices) ; diverted she claims to be a scientific- appoint a new Prime Minis-
rice to the black' market, minded radical Socialist like ter at the first opportunity
(where its price has shot her father. After her mother's. Transparent as was the plot,,
up 300 per cent); closed an death, she became sickly her- Indira Gandhi seemed to ac-
eye to these and other
self, but gamely studied on cept her fate, and even filed
illicit financial operation so as in Switzerland and at Oxford. the papers for, her camou-
to collect "black money" for ,Not until the outbreak of flaged adversary's nomination
election campaigns; let the World Wi-r II did she-.return- to the Presidency. At the
poor go poorer,. the hungry j to - India for medical care: same time, she was secretly
go hungrier, the youth Going back with her was a' operating in a circle of de-
go jobless, the small farmers fellow Indian student, a bud-. ception inside that of the
.g6- under while big land- ding lawyer named Feroze. party leaders, emplacing her
lords -flourish. `Resigned- as Gandhi. (Neither he nor she own people in the party ma-
they are to such timeless af- is related to Mahatma Gan- chine. One day, suddenly, 'she
flictions, India'& impoverished dhi.) They were married in moved. From that day to the
masses have given signs of a 1942, but drifted apart after next, she threw her support
growing feeling that this time i about 10 years. . to a Presidential candidate
"she" is,to blame. not' beholden to the bosses
In 1947, when Nehru be- and mounted a campaign in
When they speak came Prime Minister, Indira
his support that left the old
of Mrs. Gandhi moved in with her. widowed party leaders reeling.
. as "she nowa- father in Delhi. There as his
Gays; it is not official hostess, she assumed Her man- won in a land-
always with their old affec- the role of his closest political slide, and, in the 1971 general
don. Still, when. she declared confidant and became a pow- elections, she won an un
that ."the Indian people have er in her father's Congress precedented two-thirds ma-
known me =since my child- party, the machine that to jority in Parliament. Her next
hood" (in the same speech in this day dominates the Indian ' opportunity came with the,
which she proclaimed the political scene. As president . Pakistani Government's harsh
state of emergency), the claim of the party, she came to crackdown on the Bengali
was fair. They remember her know its leaders first-hand, autonomy movement in East
as the granddaughter of hard- and from her father she began' Pakistan and the resultant
as-nails Motilal Nehru, one of to learn how to manipulate flood of Bengali refugees into
the founders of India's Con- them. She learned, among oth- India. Seeming for months to
gress movement, ---which_ er things, that the party's disregard domestic calls for
brought independence from main role was to garner votes' intervention, she waited mas-
the British; as the daughter '.. in elections and that, in fur- terfully,for the right moment
of.. deft, charismatic Jawa- therance of - this end, it and struck with the $2-billion
harlal Nehru, India's first was necessary' to tolerate a in arms she had obtained
Prime Minister after independ- certain amount of corruption, from the Soviet Union. It was
ence; -as the little girl who even to- help` cover it.. As a blitzkrieg,, a soaring victory
sat on the knee of Mahatma for the real., power, she was that led to the creation of the
Gandhi, the lay saint of India, - ' taught by Nehru that it- be- independent state of Ban-
and as a pupil of the ven- longed in the Prime Minister's gladesh, a reduction.of Pakis-
erated national poet Rabin-- hands. - tan to subordinate status on
dranath Tagore. This was the woman, then,- the subcontinent - and an-;
Indira was a lonely, child; still shy, still a bit irresolute, other triumph at the ballot.
both her parents spent more not yet -deeply experienced, box. In the 1972 state elec-'
time in jail than out, fight: that the party bosses picked tions she swept all but two
ing British colonial rule; as their Prime Minister two of the 21 states. -
Her grandmother used to years after Nehru's death.' ` Next came the annexation,
lament to her that it was all They agreed, on the choice without so much as by-your-
occurring in expiation of the. because they believed Indira leave, of defenseless Sikkim,
lofty, - elite - Nehru family's would be. a cinch to push a - tiny, . sovereign border
past transgressions. Her around. Goongi diya, the princedom. Then came a satel
mother, the beautiful but frail Dumb Doll, they called her. lite launched into space. Then
Kamala, too was "given to in those days, never dreaming a nuclear test explosion. "The
interludes of soul-searching they would live to regret it. onl man in India " was the
though she delivered so muc
in political, military and pres
tige terms, she had promis
of economic betterment
Hatao, the abolition of pov
Indira Gandhi persisted i
tinued to be- pampered; only
1,700 of them in all of India
more than $1,300 last year. In
1971, the year, she pledged to
abolish poverty, some220 mil-
lion-of her countrymen were
living on 20 cents a day -or
less. Today, the number has
swelled to 385 million, nearly
two-thirds of the population.
With each succeeding year
since she made that vow,
been slipping below the of-
ficially computed poverty line
-in effect, starvation line-
of 15 cents a day.
And grumbling more and
more. Not even her consum-
mate grandstanding in the
arena of world politics could
any longer deflect the vital
-concern of the Indian public
about the effects - of. the
drought. It had become too
big, too hurtful, ravaging the
country's grain crops while
.water itself was running des-
perately short.
Nobody knows how many
Indians have starved to death
in- this fourth- famine year.
in the countryside, especially,
members of Parliament have
testified. to "horrible" famine
conditions. One local Congress
party official who toured 40
villages in Madhya Pradesh
found that nine in every 10
families did not have a grain
of wheat or rice and were liv-
ing on wild fruit. Others have
told gf people- driven by hun-
ger to suicide, or eating grass
and roots. In the Cooch Behar
region of West Bengal, there
are reports of people eating
-their own dead children. The
Government has released no
figures on deaths by starva-
tion; nor, if it did, would they
be likely to include those too
undernourished. to resist the
mildest illness. "When a weak
old man died after waiting
.1 1
e diet of her rateful and in a queue for hours under a
sticism-hers ins
even m
ired A fi
t
p
y
, oo y v
rs
1 10.9-1~ :,;a . CIA Q13R .9t.01194A0001003i"q tq get his food ration,
by the disdain AruirnhiPAPFOr Jzea
g
buMiffolte, Rays Me SOMIMY
editor of The Times of India.
 CPYRGHT
Ajit Bhattach a d: - '
ha after ca111n? at 41
her invi- An- do cricinnanr loaRorchin
"
an accurate statistic?
Nevertheless, there are
plenty of statistics to show,
how much poorer India's poor.
are getting. The current five-
year plan estimates that not
until 1980 will the bottom
fifth of the population (about
120 million now, about 190
million by then) be eating as
much as they did in 1960.
Meanwhile, . the average In-
dian, who used to consume
480 grams of food grainsa,
day in _ the early nineteen-,
sixties, is"down to 418 grams;
a day, while his consumption
of meat has dropped from
three kilos a year to less than
two. Three-quarters of the In-?
than people have no assured`
work and earn less than $50
a year; nearly half earn less
than $40 a year,. and per capita.
income has been falling stead-
ily for the last three years in
a row. Thirty million adult
Indians are unemployed; rural.
unemployment has risen 600
per cent in the past two
decades; and unemployment
among the educated is' in-
creasing by 20 per cent' a
year: Of the 16 million youths
who gradulfed from Indian
colleges in 1974, one in "three
cannot find a job of any kind.
Meeting her for
the first . time,
you'd never be-
lieve she was a
decision-maker. The woman
waiting serenely at her un-
cluttered desk when I came-
to see - her last winter in
Delhi's' Lok Sabha (national
Parliament) was unexpectedly
small, delicate and feminine.
inine.
The stark white streak- in her'
short black hair seemed more
a touch of elegance than a
token of her 57 years., ,Her-,
voice was soft, and her
glance offen strayed with a
glint of humor to the deferen-
tial- aide hovering at her.
elbow, . for the statistics she
told me she could never keep
in her head. She dismissed,
as uninteresting or unimpor-
tant, my suggestion' that she
must occasionally feel crushed
by the weight of her moral.
authority. "What can you do
with- moral. authority?" she
.... G?nulpic, WIt 11 1 usncu tation, he had tried to make has been succeeded by an
her how she viewed the na-
tion's economic problems and
the Government's ability to
cope with them, she an-
swered, "Surely, we have
problems, but many are due
to causes beyond our control, :
like the weather. Most others
are of a passing nature, in-
evitable in the growth'
process." "In-any case," she
said with utter confidence,
"India will certainly manage
to keep up in its food produc-
tion 'with the growth in popu-
lation, and we will. be getting
out of our economic troubles
soon." When I asked her how
she planned to achieve this,
she went on 'to-' speak of
something else.
While conceding that "in
some cases we are not as
efficient as we should be,"
she evidently considered that'!
a minor obstacle. The big '
problem, as she saw it, was
that "certain opponents are
getting in the- Government's
way by taking political ad-
vantage of our economic dif-
ficulties in the name of
democracy"-a pointed thrust
at her increasingly trouble-
some opponent, J. P. Narayan.
In fact, she- appeared to be-
lieve) or wanted me to believe,
that such troublesome oppo-
sition was the one thing "pre-
venting" her Government from ?
"solving India's food problems
. right away." When I observed ,
that she was being accused
of trying 'to suppress the op-
position-if only to get on
with the solution of such ur-
gent problems-she replied in
that 'soft voice, "it is the
responsibility of the ruling
party not to suppress the op-
position." Adding, still softly,'
"Of course, it is also the
responsibility of the opposi-
tion not to obstruct the func-
tioning of the Govgrnment."
That is her style. Most - of
the several hundred people
passing through her office
daily do all the talking, while
she listens, or doesn't, with-
out comment. Many a reporter
has gone through the ordeal
of an interview ' with the
Prime Minister when, not car-
and finally )eft, without her
having once lifted her head
from the letters she was sign-
ing, still less uttering a word
to him. The tacit message
of her behavior is that the
Prime Minister is there to
dispose, not discuss; especial.
ly a Prime Minister who is
a Nehru, the scion 'of India's
founding family.
And so, though she, can
rightfully claim that all of
India has known her since
childhood,' it is also true that,
outside her innermost family
circle of two sons, an Italian
daughter -in': law and two
.grandchildren, :_nobody really
knows her. Described as aJ
"very private person"' or a
"haughty Kashmiri Brahmin,"-
depending on who. does the
describing, she holds almost
all her closest collaborators
at arm's-length..
One day when -Indira was
an adolescent,- according. to
her latest biographer, Krishan
Bhatia, an aunt saw her
-standing at the window, gaz-
ing out. over the garden of
the. family residence, her
eyes- burning with passion.
Asked what she was thinking
of, she said -she was dreaming
of Joan of Arc. It 'seems that
from childhood her greatest
ambition was to become the
Joan of India, and from the
time she first became active
in the Congress party, the
model of the superheroine of
world politics has dominated
her feelings about her own
role. And, for a while, as
Prime Minister, her vision of
herself, holding. high the em-
blem -of Socialism as. she led
her .people into battle against '
the tyranny of poverty, was
shared by -a good part. of the
country. She is still a larger-
than-life heroine to millions
of Indians, ?especially in the.
countryside, but from a
daughter of the people she has `
evolved into India's most ad-
roit and ruthless politician.
"My father was a salat who
strayed into politics . . . but I
am not of the same . stuff,"
she has said of herself, 'while
assertion of dictatorial au-
thority, her Joan-of-Arc mis-
sion replaced' by the mission
of staying in power.
The way she now runs the
country, every Cabinet minis=
ter, party functionary or other
high office-holder knows he
holds his job solely at her
pleasure. In the 18 states
(all but three) now under
the party's control, every
chief minister has been hand-
picked by her. None has had
his own local power base.
None has dared to decide any-
thing of importance without
consulting her: During his
first 666 days in office as
Chief Minister of West-Ben-
gal, Siddhartha Sankar Ray
spent 306 days iii the national
capital, mostly in Mrs. Gand
hi's waiting room. And none
has had to worry much. about
his personal future, provided
he showed undeviating loyal-
ty to the Prime Minister and
? could produce at election
time.
Naturally, producing _ at
election time is no simple
matter anywhere. Among a
Congress. party politician's '
heaver duties has been the col-'
1ection of undeclared "black
money" - from businessmen,
black marketqers, hoarders,
smugglers and assorted tax
dodgers - for financing elec-
tion campaigns. The sums
thus collected (or extorted,
some say) have run into many
millions, with'estimates going
as high as $26-million for last
year's election in Mrs. Gand-
hi's home state of Uttar
Pradesh. Nationwide, says
Krishan Bhatia, the Congress
party itself has become "one
of the biggest hoarders of un-
declared cash in the country."
Provided an appointee of
Mrs. Gandhi's can produce in
that sense, he can generally
count on her protection, how-
ever grossly inefficient he
may be , at anything else,
beyond his own enrichment.
Time and again, she has.
shielded national and ? state
officials with egregious rec-
ords of corruption. Among a
few random examples are a
with a small, amused big for their questions, she
asked
,
,
g
ss
Henry
smile. has sat in stony silence as The lady is cold-blooded and
The rest of the interview former Chief Minister of
though the questions had H Orissa who accepted $100,000
ow tough, she.
leaf traders for
she .kept on ttAV1~ 4hF0 ' ~' 1 C~~~t " ~~eQ'~19QQ( ~0-4~~(ijn '
lane: detached terns ion o c a o d avors ren ered; the Punjab's
, her
p patiently' day, many might say of "
er said of her
in
Ki
 CPYRGHT
mally accused pqrtg or ,1#," - n, o anything else iusa_
commercial private farms on eran Western European diplo- ingly low consumption level.
lands set aside for redistribu- mat, "Mrs. Gandhi may not There _ was a time, from.
tion to the Untouchables; have known precisely what a 1951 to 1973, when this gap
three ministers of the Mad- bank was, and she certainly was made up by 92 million
hya Pradesh- government didn't know what nationalize- tons of free or concessional
charged with raisappropriat- tion was, but she knew it' food grains from abroad, roost-
ing $3-million of the $4-mil- was time todo it." ~ ly from the United States.
lion allocated for "scarcity re- Judged by results, her eco- (American aid to India in all
lief operations" in the state; nomic record can only be called forms has exceeded $10-
bit-and' the use by the Revenue dismal. Mostly, it has consisted lion since Independence in
Minister of Andhra Pradesh of of Socialist experimentation.. 1947.) That made it pretty
vast state resources for his On paper, the country's indus simple to keep up an indus-
daughter's 16-day wedding trial capacity ranks ninth in trial growth rate of 8 per
cejebration, including official the world. But its public "sector cent-until Indira Gandhi de-
cars, guest houses, furniture, industries, on the. average, are tided she didn't want or need
foreign food aid any more.,
state-employed servants and working at, less than half of
huge quantities of ghee, rice, capacity, steel. mills at 40 Mrs. Gandhi's proud . an- f
vegetables and fruit , meant per - cent, electrical power nouncement to that effect in
for religious, pilgrims but im- plants at 35 per cent; and 1971 was made in a moment
pounded -to feed the minister's nearly a third of all the capi. of euphoria never attained
10,000 guests. tal invested for develop- before, or since. The previous
None of these, cases can ment has been wasted on idle year`s -monsoons . had been
hold a candle, of course, to plant and equipment. The re- marvelous, and she had- a
the one involving Mrs. sulting shortages, blockages, r sensational crop of 108 mil-
Gandhi's 24-year-old son bottlenecks and breakdowns. lion tons. in "1972, however,:
Sanjay, entrusted 'several in practically every vital sec- the rains failed disastrously,
years ago, with $40-million-. tor - coal, steel, 'railroad worse than in any year that
and 300 acres of choice real transport, fertilizer and food . anyone could remember. -The
estate to turn out a small distribution, electric power- harvest was some 10 million
Maruti. car, for which he are maddening and incalcu- tons below the previous
has yet to produce -the pro- - lably costly; Production of es. year's. It was then that. Indira
totype. The' cumulative effect sential consumer necessities Gandhi launched a crash pro-
of all these scandals has been keeps -'dropping, - While tele - gram aimed at increasing
devastating. "Indira .. , has- `vision sets, air-conditioners, wheat production by a third failed her country in many cosmetics, crockery, deter- and more than doubling the
- crop, all in a
more ways than her response gents, chocolates and talcum summer
year. rice Tcis was t be
to the economic disasters powder choke the market.
wrought by war and caprici- Medicines are -desperately done by bringing 20 per cent ous monsoons," writes Krish-short, cooking oil is adulter- more acreage under cultiva
ated St edibilit and the -lion and providing special
Y
so widespread and so, taken
for granted that most 'obser-
vers assume that 20 or 30
of every 100 rupees spent
on the program went into
kickbacks in one' form or an-
other.
Still, the central Govern-
ment- kept handing out the
money, while local adminis-
trators enthusiastically re-
ported overfulfillment of their
agricultural, goals. They did
so with the use of what the
Russians would call "ceiling
statistics"-a phrase coined. in
the. early days of Soviet plan-
ning, when a collective farm
manager, asked, 'say, how
much livestock he had, would
look up at the ceiling, scratch
-his neck and--come up with
a figure. A later report, by
India's Auditor-General re-
vealed that not one of
the 21 states had come
remotely near meeting its tar-
gets. Although the 1973 sum-
mer rains were good, food
grain output, far from rising
by a projected 15 million tons,
fell by 3.5 million tons
below the previous year's.
Having renounced food aid,
India had to pay for what she
got from abroad, and Mrs.
Gandhi has had to spend up
to $2-billion a year on food
imports.
. s
an Bhatia. "Her years 01 1
country produces just enough farm credits, more fertilizer,
power have witnessed a l di s- trY p high-yield seeds, pesticides, ver since her election,
tressing debasement of poiti= cotton cloth for 12 yards ofvictory of four
cal values, a staggering cotton per person per year in tube wells,_pumpsets and ex- ago, years Indira Gandhi
increase in, corruption at. all statistical terms-enough for tra
It wasric oweedible suppo hashad all the power
levels, including the top, two saris for the average In- sition, a Socialist planner's she required to accomplish the
callous misuse of authority than woman, who wears this radical changes admin- i form of dress throughout the pipe dream. India hadn't a that India
and declinein year. prayer of procuring even half, needs in order to begin curing
istrative d a a sharp
efficiency." The most damning indict- the fertilizer needed, still less her profound debilities. Draft
What kept. -her popular g -the indicated quantities of legislation for this has been
among the masses was a bril- ment of Socialism, Indian seeds, pesticides, cement and avt:ilable for some time,
liantly intuitive sense of the style, however, has been the drilling rigs. Perpetual and gathering dust in ministry
political. master stroke.' The . .Government's."colossal apathy- worsening power failures files. Some of it is designed
greatest of these,. perhaps, was toward and appalling neg- made it useless to provide to redress the hopeless lot of
the nationalization of the lest of_ agriculture," says new electrical pumpsets or the Indian peasant,
banks in 1969. The move had former Planning Director B. even to "energize" old ones.' Under the land-reform law
nothing to. do with "ideology. S. Minhas. He and other ex- The "input shortages" alone -on the books, there has been
Locked in battle for control pew claim that India, even ' would have ruled out achiev- redistribution-in name-of
of the party, she seized on the with her mushrooming popu- ? ing anything near the project- agricultural holdings. In ac-
issue to pose as a champion lotion, ought to be able to ed gains-which, to have any tual fact, however, large land-
of the poor seeking to free the feed herself. Yet, with much chance of success, would have owners have managed to keep
party of its reactionary - old more of her arable land under had to be planned at least huge holdings by using mem-
guard. For' weeks afterward, cultivation than - any other two years ahead. On top of bers of their families and
her house was thronged with country, she Is getting much -that, India was faced with front names to put plots
lower yields than her Asian an accelerat:n breakdown In. the capital's humblest citizens' g together. And although land
-ricksha pullers, petty trod- neighbors. China, for in-
stance, is feeding her, 800 ransport, services and power, values have risen fivefold
ers; Junior clerks-bearing gar- and with the irresistible temp- since strains of "miracle
lands-of flowers. Though the million people, notwithstand- lotions for local goc?rntnent grain" were introduced in the
nationalized banks promptly ing droughts, floods and other officials to juggle with such mid-sixties, the big owners
went into they, is of, India is stilt able to find enough
there, she nev 1 or 6o99911 I pClPa'~j M , Q} 003106 ft-TI
diant humanitarian iineee "~kE between production and con- minuco of rte,?amman# funds
 Approved For Release 1999/09/02 : CIA-RDP79-01194A000100310001-1
CPYRGHT
their holdin aynasty rounded by grand- ference for "Socialism" of could send the country lurch-
gs. Meanwhile, father Motilal Nehru. It is the some kind'over capitalism of ing into the Soviet orbit.
more than two-thirds of In- sort of environment " she is whatever kind, especially Neither development is likely
dia's rural population owns known to prefer in times of American.
no land at all or, at best, stress. to _ leave the Indian Army
less than five acres ' Yet her relations with the unmoved. And that gets to
per fami- Yet her position- could be-
Iy. Most in the second catego-
ry are so .heavily in debt
to big landowners that they
cannot really be called owners
.of their' land. True land re-
form would 'cancel their in-
debtedness, make credits easi-
ly available to them, and ef-
come intolerable at almost Russians before the "emer- What is perhaps the crux-of
any time. Expressions of soli- gency" weren't all. that thick. the situation.
clarity from the Congress Par- Publicly, Mrs. Gandhi has India's standing army of
never tired of pointing out nearly a million men has been
ty are all very well. The ques- how loyally the Soviet Union resolutely nonpolitical since
tion is, what value to place has supported India in crises independence: But it is also
on this support. It comes from like the Bangladesh war. She sensitive to the smallest slight
a party, after all, set up to doesn't mention the fact that on its honor
dignit
be of help to th
and mill
Prim
i
i
,
y
e
-
e M
n
s- the Russians have
fectively break up large and ter mainly at election time. given her tart' independence, not to
o new economic credits since . mention the nation's sover-.
illegal holdings so that the Indira Gandhi has deliberately n
1966.
small farmer could have his kept it flabby in - other trade Nor that the renewed eignty; and it is steeped in re ' share. But the landlords op- spects, so that it would not for trade agreement with them loyalty to constitutional prin-
pose any such reform. And get In her way-as her father 1975 did not include the ' ciples. It was altogether her
the Congress party de nds urgently needed petroleum, her. When she more-heavily on the bigland- needs people out in the streets fertilizers, raw materials and questioned legitimacy off con-
owners than on any other on her behalf-and thousands wheat she had counted on- stitutional rule. It may not
single sector in the country. were said to have been paid this compared to continuing be, should its ranking officers
And Mrs. Gandhi depends on a dollar apiece to cheer her aid from a Western consor- conclude that she has be-
tium, " including the United
the party. Even a dictator at mass rallies in New Delhi come something else. More
needs a country-wide organi- last June--only the 'States, that has committed than ever now. her fate hangs
zation in order to assert con- s , Pa pro-Mos- $1.4-billion to India this year. on the army's continuing
cow Communist rty is in
trol,' and Mrs. Gandhi, not a position to turn them out loyalty.
yet ' an outright dictator, re- A Communist part
claim ndira Gandhi is perha
S
bod
e
m
y,
ps.
ome
y onc
told
e, as
mains beholden to her patty ing a mere 350,000 membe rs. more powerful than I was traveling around Indir
as the only country-wide poli= (more likely closer to 250,000) JL ever before, but she is that the one thing worse thk,
tical organization in existence may look like a pretty weak - also more alone There trying to govern the country
in India. She also needs it reed in- a nation of 600 mil- is no one left to share with by democratic persuasion
to keep up.-a facade of the lion. Nevertheless, it has long her the blame of the regime's would be trying to govern it
constitutional government she provided Mrs. Gandhi with failings, no one of any stature by force. Yet that is how Mrs.
claims to want `to uphold. some of her most trusted ad- to partake with her,-in, the ' Gandhi is trying to do it now.
Since making that 'claim visers, ideological guidance in task of running her vast. Depending on how fast and
and using it to justify imposi- -the pursuit of Socialism, and benighted nation, how far she goes in changing
tion of the state of emergen- the capacity to mobilize street So desperately isolated has from a traditional Prime
cy, she has withdrawn more mobs at a moment's notice. she become, so driven . into Minister to 'the one-woman
than ever into her private This is not to say, that Mrs. new 'repressions that cut off ruler of a police stare, the
circle. Old advisers have dis- Gandhi necessarily likes the her line of retreat, that the Indian Army-the one group
appeared, to be replaced by Indian Communists' of the dynamics ' of staying on top with the power to stop the
a handful of new ones, nota- pro-Soviet variety, or even mAy well push her into be- process-could intervene. If it
bly her young son Sanjay. She - the Soviet Union, though Rus- coming a real dictator. And, were to do so, it would almost
still rushes home every lunch sia looms larger. than any though she is not the woman certainly be not- to replace
to play with her two grand- other state. in her foreign rela- to make India anyone'., satel- her with a mMe' ry dictator
children, ever more the tions. It does mean that she lite if she can help it, her but to restore institutions
Oriental dowager, ever more has some. ideological affinity - increasing dependence on it has been drilled into defend-
closely drawn into _ the with both, in her-marked pre- Moscow and the Communists ' ing since, birth.
Approved For Release 1999/09/02 : CIA-RDP79-01194A000100310001-1