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NEHRU- Glimpses of Greatness

I saw Nehru in tears and in most disconsolate moments. On such occasions there was a tragic grandeur on his face. One evening, on his return to Anand Bhawan after he had performed the last rites of his mother, I saw him sitting all alone in his drawing-room under the shade of an electric lamp-picking up this magazine and that and turning a page here and a page there. He was feeling very disconsolate and was trying to overcome his grief. He was making a deliberate attempt to forget all that had happened. But obviously he could not. I watched his face for about half an hour from outside the room and that face seemed to be soaked in sorrow. That look of his still lingers in my memory. That face, that shade, that moment, that expression, will perhaps, never be erased from my mind.

Colonel Louis Johnson was in India for some time as the personal envoy of Presid0ent Roosevelt. He met Nehru and was charmed by him. He gave expression to his fondness for him in the course of a statement which he issued to the press when he was leaving India. When the Cripps negotiations were going on in New Delhi, Col. Johnson was there and met Nehru frequently. He was intrigued to see Nehru in churidar pyjamas. He wondered how anyone could get into them. One day he apologetically enquired, “Permit me to ask, Mr. Nehru, how do you get into these pyjamas ?” Promptly Nehru said, “But they get on me all right.” As he said this there was laughter and later he explained to Col. Johnson the “mechanism” of the churidar pyjamas.

Yet another story of this kind. It is said that once in London, Nehru was invited to address a meeting and he went there in a shervani and churidar pyjamas. As he stood up to speak there was a slight flutter in some corners of the hall, because some people felt that Nehru was wearing only long underwear and had forgotten to put on this trousers !

Nehru was a shepherd who most gently and carefully looked after the flock around him. I can recall many instances of his very considerate nature; but here I will state only a few. After his release from Ahmadnagar Fort, he travelled all over the country to acquire first-hand information of the events that took place in the wake of 1942 rebellion. I shadowed him almost everywhere in U. P. He addressed mammoth gatherings and I was keenly interested in reporting him fully and faithfully. For me news dispatches came first and every other thing afterwards. But this was not possible in the company of Nehru. He would command us to be present punctually whenever there was tea, dinner or lunch. At times his admirers would force him to eat a little fruit or sweet before them which they had brought for him. Never did he taste anything without sharing it with the members of his entourage. I was very keen to follow minutely the animated conversations that followed between him and his admirers and eating on such occasions was a kind of atmospheric disturbance for me. But his was a different approach.

One day in Ballia after a meeting, I immediately rushed to my typewriter, not realizing it was dinner time, and started beating it furiously to turn out the copy quickly and dump it at the telegraph office. Panditji came to the dining-table. He looked around and found me missing. “Where is that crazy fellow ?” he was reported to have shouted. In order to save me from his “wrath”, no one gave him any clue of my whereabouts. He thundered, “I can imagine where this man must be.”

He came to my little room and holding me by the collar of my “kurta”, he dragged me to the dining-hall, repeatedly saying, “To hell with your reporting.” I was thrust into a chair. None sympathized with me. Everyone laughed and Panditji joined in. I felt very silly, but was overwhelmed by his affectionate consideration for others. He was always big in a big way.

Nehru at an early age became a whole-time Congress worker and he felt that he was a financial burden to his father. He mentioned this to Gandhiji. His desire was to stand on his own feet. The Mahatma wrote to Nehru :
“Shall I try to arrange for some money for you ? Why may you not take up remunerative work ? After all you must live by the sweat of your brow even though you may be under Father’s roof. Will you be correspondent to some newspapers ? Or will you take up a professorship?”