Why Nathuram Godse killed M. K. Gandhi…

The statement that you are about to read is the last made by Godse before the Court on the 5th of May 1949. Such was the power and eloquence of this statement that one of the judges, G. D. Khosla, later wrote, “I have, however, no doudt that had the audience of that day been constituted into a jury and entrusted with the task of deciding Godse’s appeal, they would have brought a verdict of ‘not Guilty’ by an overwhelming majority”

“Born in a devotional Brahmin family, I instinctively came to revere Hindu religion, Hindu history and Hindu culture. I had, therefore, been intensely proud of Hinduism as a whole. As I grew up I developed a tendency to free thinking unfettered by any superstitious allegiance to any isms, political or religious. That is why I worked actively for the eradication of untouchability and the caste system based on birth alone. I openly joined anti-caste movements and maintained that all Hindus were of equal status as to rights, social and religious and should be considered high or low on merit alone and not through the accident of birth in a particular caste or profession. I used publicly to take part in organized anti-caste dinners in which thousands of Hindus, Brahmins, Kshatriyas, Vaisyas, Chamars and Bhangis participated. We broke the caste rules and dined in the company of each other. I have read the speeches and writings of Dadabhai Naoroji, Vivekanand, Gokhale, Tilak, along with the books of ancient and modern history of India and some prominent countries like England, France, America and Russia. Moreover I studied the tenets of Socialism and Marxism. But above all I studied very closely whatever Veer Savarkar and Gandhiji had written and spoken, as to my mind these two ideologies have contributed more to the moulding of the thought and action of the Indian people during the last thirty years or so, than any other single factor has done.“

 ”All this reading and thinking led me to believe it was my first duty to serve Hindudom and Hindus both as a patriot and as a world citizen. To secure the freedom and to safeguard the just interests of some thirty crores (300 million) of Hindus would automatically constitute the freedom and the well-being of all India, one fifth of human race. This conviction led me naturally to devote myself to the Hindu Sanghtanist ideology and programme, which alone, I came to believe, could win and preserve the national Independence of Hindustan, my Motherland, and enable her to render true service to humanity as well.“

“Since the year 1920, that is, after the demise of Lokamanya Tilak, Gandhiji’s influence in the Congress first increased and then became supreme. His activities for public awakening were phenomenal in their intensity and were reinforced by the slogan of truth and non-violence which he paraded ostentatiously before the country. No sensible or enlightened person could object to those slogans. In fact there is nothing new or original in them. They are implicit in every constitutional public movement. But it is nothing but a mere dream if you imagine that the bulk of mankind is, or can ever become, capable of scrupulous adherence to these lofty principles in its normal life from day to day.” 

“In fact, honour, duty and love of one’s own kith and kin and country might often compel us to disregard non-violence and to use force. I could never conceive that an armed resistance to an aggression is unjust. I would consider it a religious and moral duty to resist and, if possible, to overpower such an enemy by use of force. [In the Ramayana] Rama killed Ravana in a tumultuous fight and relieved Sita.. [In the Mahabharata] , Krishna killed Kansa to end his wickedness; and Arjuna had to fight and slay quite a number of his friends and relations including the revered Bhishma because the latter was on the side of the aggressor. It is my firm belief that in dubbing Rama, Krishna and Arjuna as guilty of violence, the Mahatma betrayed a total ignorance of the springs of human action. In more recent history, it was the heroic fight put up by Chhatrapati Shivaji that first checked and eventually destroyed the Muslim tyranny in India. It was absolutely essentially for Shivaji to overpower and kill an aggressive Afzal Khan, failing which he would have lost his own life. In condemning history’s towering warriors like Shivaji, Rana Pratap and Guru Gobind Singh as misguided patriots, Gandhiji has merely exposed his self-conceit. He was, paradoxical as it may appear, a violent pacifist who brought untold calamities on the country in the name of truth and non-violence, while Rana Pratap, Shivaji and the Guru will remain enshrined in the hearts of their countrymen for ever for the freedom they brought to them.”

“The accumulating provocation of thirty-two years, culminating in his last pro-Muslim fast, at last goaded me to the conclusion that the existence of Gandhi should be brought to an end immediately. Gandhi had done very good in South Africa to uphold the rights and well-being of the Indian community there. But when he finally returned to India he developed a subjective mentality under which he alone was to be the final judge of what was right or wrong. If the country wanted his leadership, it had to accept his infallibility; if it did not, he would stand aloof from the Congress and carry on his own way. Against such an attitude there can be no halfway house. Either Congress had to surrender its will to his and had to be content with playing second fiddle to all his eccentricity, whimsicality, metaphysics and primitive vision, or it had to carry on without him. He alone was the Judge of everyone and every thing; he was the master brain guiding the civil disobedience movement; no other could know the technique of that movement.The most dictatorial He alone knew when to begin and when to withdraw it. The movement might succeed or fail, it might bring untold disaster and political reverses but that could make no difference to the Mahatma’s infallibility. ‘A Satyagrahi can never fail’ was his formula for declaring his own infallibility and nobody except himself knew what a Satyagrahi is. Thus, the Mahatma became the judge and jury in his own cause. These childish insanities and obstinacies, coupled with a most severe austerity of life, ceaseless work and lofty character made Gandhi formidable and irresistible. Many people thought that his politics were irrational but they had either to withdraw from the Congress or place their intelligence at his feet to do with as he liked. In a position of such absolute irresponsibility Gandhi was guilty of blunder after blunder, failure after failure, disaster after disaster. Gandhi’s pro-Muslim policy is blatantly in his perverse attitude on the question of the national language of India. It is quite obvious that Hindi has the most prior claim to be accepted as the premier language. In the beginning of his career in India, Gandhi gave a great impetus to Hindi but as he found that the Muslims did not like it, he became a champion of what is called Hindustani.. Everybody in India knows that there is no language called Hindustani; it has no grammar; it has no vocabulary. It is a mere dialect, it is spoken, but not written. It is a bastard tongue and cross-breed between Hindi and Urdu, and not even the Mahatma’s sophistry could make it popular. But in his desire to please the Muslims he insisted that Hindustani alone should be the national language of India. His blind followers, of course, supported him and the so-called hybrid language began to be used.”

“The charm and purity of the Hindi language was to be prostituted to please the Muslims. All his experiments were at the expense of the Hindus. From August 1946 onwards the private armies of the Muslim League began a massacre of the Hindus. The then Viceroy, Lord Wavell, though distressed at what was happening, would not use his powers under the Government of India Act of 1935 to prevent the rape, murder and arson. The Hindu blood began to flow from Bengal to Karachi with some retaliation by the Hindus. The Interim Government formed in September was sabotaged by its Muslim League members right from its inception, but the more they became disloyal and treasonable to the government of which they were a part, the greater was Gandhi’s infatuation for them. Lord Wavell had to resign as he could not bring about a settlement and he was succeeded by Lord Mountbatten. King Log was followed by King Stork. The Congress which had boasted of its nationalism and socialism secretly accepted Pakistan literally at the point of the bayonet and abjectly surrendered to Jinnah. India was vivisected and one-third of the Indian territory became foreign land to us from August 15, 1947.”

“Lord Mountbatten came to be described in Congress circles as the greatest Viceroy and Governor-General this country ever had. The official date for handing over power was fixed for June 30, 1948, but Mountbatten with his ruthless surgery gave us a gift of vivisected India ten months in advance. This is what Gandhi had achieved after thirty years of undisputed dictatorship and this is what Congress party calls ‘freedom’ and ‘peaceful transfer of power’. The Hindu-Muslim unity bubble was finally burst and a theocratic state was established with the consent of Nehru and his crowd and they have called ‘freedom won by them with sacrifice’ – whose sacrifice? When top leaders of Congress, with the consent of Gandhi, divided and tore the country – which we consider a deity of worship – my mind was filled with direful anger.”

“One of the conditions imposed by Gandhi for his breaking of the fast unto death related to the mosques in Delhi occupied by the Hindu refugees. But when Hindus in Pakistan were subjected to violent attacks he did not so much as utter a single word to protest and censure the Pakistan Government or the Muslims concerned. How many such Mahatma’s we have even today in the country who value the support of religious lots more than the need to create a sense of one nation.The PM still continues to divide the nation by addressing the people and Hindu Muslim Sikh Issaye during his address from the Lal Quila.Look how the power in Delhi is being distributed based on all kind of consideration other than ability to built a nation.A school drop out becomes a Cabinet Minister due his hierarchy. Gandhi was shrewd enough to know that while undertaking a fast unto death, had he imposed for its break some condition on the Muslims in Pakistan, there would have been found hardly any Muslims who could have shown some grief if the fast had ended in his death. It was for this reason that he purposely avoided imposing any condition on the Muslims. He was fully aware of from the experience that Jinnah was not at all perturbed or influenced by his fast and the Muslim League hardly attached any value to the inner voice of Gandhi. Gandhi is being referred to as the Father of the Nation. But if that is so, he had failed his paternal duty inasmuch as he has acted very treacherously to the nation by his consenting to the partitioning of it. I stoutly maintain that Gandhi has failed in his duty. He has proved to be the Father of Pakistan. His inner-voice, his spiritual power and his doctrine of non-violence of which so much is made of, all crumbled before Jinnah’s iron will and proved to be powerless. Briefly speaking, I thought to myself and foresaw I shall be totally ruined, and the only thing I could expect from the people would be nothing but hatred and that I shall have lost all my honour, even more valuable than my life, if I were to kill Gandhiji. But at the same time I felt that the Indian politics in the absence of Gandhiji would surely be proved practical, able to retaliate, and would be powerful with armed forces. No doubt, my own future would be totally ruined, but the nation would be saved from the inroads of Pakistan. People may even call me and dub me as devoid of any sense or foolish, but the nation would be free to follow the course founded on the reason which I consider to be necessary for sound nation-building. After having fully considered the question, I took the final decision in the matter, but I did not speak about it to anyone whatsoever. I took courage in both my hands and I did fire the shots at Gandhiji on 30th January 1948, on the prayer-grounds of Birla House. I do say that my shots were fired at the person whose policy and action had brought rack and ruin and destruction to millions of Hindus. There was no legal machinery by which such an offender could be brought to book and for this reason I fired those fatal shots. I bear no ill will towards anyone individually but I do say that I had no respect for the present government owing to their policy which was unfairly favourable towards the Muslims. But at the same time I could clearly see that the policy was entirely due to the presence of Gandhi.”

“I have to say with great regret that Prime Minister Nehru quite forgets that his preachings and deeds are at times at variances with each other when he talks about India as a secular state in season and out of season, because it is significant to note that Nehru has played a leading role in the establishment of the theocratic state of Pakistan, and his job was made easier by Gandhi’s persistent policy of appeasement towards the Muslims. I now stand before the court to accept the full share of my responsibility for what I have done and the judge would, of course, pass against me such orders of sentence as may be considered proper. But I would like to add that I do not desire any mercy to be shown to me, nor do I wish that anyone else should beg for mercy on my behalf. My confidence about the moral side of my action has not been shaken even by the criticism levelled against it on all sides. I have no doubt that honest writers of history will weigh my act and find the true value thereof some day in future.”

Torturegate…

President Obama wouldn’t have imagined this in his wildest dreams. Some action yes, but this is triggering not just national outrage but even the international community is showing clear signs of unhappiness. And you know what? They are making their displeasure known very well. Reminds me of a saying that when an elephant falls, even the monkes dance on it.

So what is Torturegate? As Mark Danner writes in this brilliant article “…today’s scandal emerges not from a shocking revelation of wrongdoing but from a long process of disclosure during which Americans have stared at blatant lawbreaking with apparent equanimity.” The memos released by Obama’s administration (after a lot of delibration) have stirred the proverbial bee’s nest and America stands divided on opinion.

But the question is a difficult one. What do you choose between getting information that could probably save thousands of lives and compromising ideals and trying to get every & any information from a terrorist? Ok, so somebody comes and says that “look I want to cover my a**” and declares that torture may not eventually lead to worthwhile information. Agreed. But what do you do? Ask a jehadi for information? And what if he spits on your face? Play Mahatma Gandhi with him? Who are we talking about here? A terrorist who works on the single motive called violence and officers who follow orders, jeopardising their & their loved one’s lives & peace apart from sacrificing any possible social life.

So what if the powers deemed torture to be a method of extracting information? Aren’t they the ones who get rapped when they can’t prevent an attack? Is arguing about the life of a mass murderer when thousands of innocents are at stake even worth it?

But what are the pitfalls? Do innocents get tortured just so that officers can show some information and feel that they earn their salaries? Do they use such tactics for personal gratification? Have they become sadists? Are such harsh techniques rampant? What about the “martyr” tag that a jehadi earns after being captured? Are the fundamentalist terrorists using it to motivate more terrorists? Is torture of a captured prisoner a reason for more anger to be directed towards America? These are just the questions answered here, though very very vaguely.

The bigger problem is these questions were neither asked nor answered at the right time. Even now, the right people aren’t speaking about it. But as public outrage grows, America will have to come up with some serious answers. I am impressed by Obama’s decision – understand, this is no “my predecessor was a bad guy” move. It is a clear preference for truth and humanity. It is good governance. But he will now have to take the next correct steps, else, the path is as much slippery as it has grip. I really am not able to understand why he doesn’t want the proverbial “truth panel“. He has come under some potent fire here and am sure many more will follow. Has the change man lost the plot here? Did he really miscalculate and has put his theory before the world’s realism? Though, until now, he has certainly kept the world guessing about him.

But anyways, the CIA and its officers seems to be safe. Unless, as mentioned here, the powers once again make them the scapegoats. But this shouldn’t be new to them and they should have taken enough “cover my a**” precautions. So you can actually blame them – in their jobs, it is not allowed to make mistakes.

Anyways, Torturegate is gaining in stature by the hour. At the end of it, we can be sure that there will be a conclusive settlement. Just wait to see on who’s favour.

Enough to worry about at home…

At a time when the Financial & Economic Tornado has devastated the world and when the Af-Pak Terrorism is sending dangerous signals to the world, every nation & every international organization seems to be busy. We here in India, are  in the midst of a crazy election and 20-20 cricket and obviously, we don’t have bandwidth to devote for anything else.

Meanwhile, it is important for us to understand this. Any struggle that promises freedom and power through violence (LTTE & Taliban are shining examples) is stupid and will never succeed. However, given a potent mixture of charismatic leadership, focused brainwashing and depressed community members, such groups tend to get a foothold in the society and become an unbearable pain in the neck. In the end, in the fight between the “good” and the “evil” (in generally accepted definitions: though there can never be a good or evil by themselves), it is the common man, who cares neither for the good nor for the evil and is worried only about the source of his food the next morning, who loses his everything: family, shelter, society and future.

The war between Sri Lankan Army and the LTTE is no better. This blog is one of the many thousands that exist in the Internet speaking up against the atrocities being committed against humanity in the island. The blog has gruesome photos and commentary after reading which I am more than shocked that nothing similar has ever been mentioned or reported by any major news channel or newspaper in India. And I am sure, there has not been any reporting elsewhere either. After all, we have enough rapists, molesters, actors, cricketers and politicians to hog our headlines right?

The LTTEis an aberration, that has succeeded to exist because of the shortsightedness of both world leaders (who preach “war on terror”) and regional satraps (who preach “regionalism”). Imagine: you enter a country that belongs to someone else (and your Government and its intelligence agencies sort of promise to back you up), then overpopulate that country and finally ask for the country to be divided!! Interesting plot? Throw in some superb turns in the story such as parties with vested interests arming he terrorist group (so that money can be minted through deals – remember bofors?), RAW, the intelligence agency of India training the terrorists themselves (a la Osama from CIA or Maulana Mashood Azhar of ISI), then withdrawing support and causing chaos in the name of peace keeping (IPKF?) to finally creating a huge depression – economically & socially in the country. Neighbour’s loss is always our gain right?

Today, when we talk about the mischief that the Pakistani ISI commits in India, we must understand that we Indians are no less capable. The situation in Sri Lanka is ample proof to our atrocities. Also, even in Pakistan, the situation is same as India because RAW has consistently worked on destabilising the country. And to have people like M. Karunanidhi, the senile Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu heading a population of over 6 crores rant on public television that Velupillai Prabhakaran (LTTE Chief) is his personal friend and his death would give him immense grief is a clear indicator of the deplorable politics we live with. Especially considering that Rajiv Gandhi was killed by these very terrorist he is close with and his party is in an alliance with the Congress (Rajiv’s Party) to rule the country. Such blatant opportunism can survive only in India.

Regionalism is not new to India either. Tamil Nadu has for a long time wanted to become a separate nation itself (and may be merge with Sri Lanka if the Karunanidhi’s Family are given due importance). The “sons of soil” campaigns run by Bal & Raj Thackeray, the Kashmir Hurriyat and North-East Conflicts have all proved one important theory – Indians are united only geographically. Every other front, there rises conflict. But such issues are deemed not important and we pride ourselves on our culture, heritage and lineage (things that cease to matter when humanity is in shambles) to sweep them under the carpet. I have been saying this and I hope it doesn’t turn out to be true: one day Mumbaikars will fight with Punekars and Iyers with Iyengars (they already do – but it is yet not an armed battle).

What do we elect Governments for? The bijlee, sadak & paani (though not having reached everyone) has been replaced with finance, religion & security for quite some time now without any notable progress. If LTTE has survived for 25 years, the battle for Kashmir has existed for decades and cost thousands of lives. As common people, do we ever ask if these issues are irresolvable? Never. We are happy as long as we can watch cinema & cricket safely.

What about international organizations like UN, Amnesty or Red Cross? Have they succeeded in achieving even 10% of what they were set up to? They continue to remain toothless and produce voluminous reports on how people lost their lives, how many children were murdered in cold blood, how many families were wrecked and how many litres of blood was shed. For them, it is about the numbers.

When people tell me that we as human beings have evolved, I am surprised. We continue to remain barbarians fighting for land, money, women & power when life itself is not permanent.

A joke comes to my mind. Once, a British traveller visits a native African village where they practice cannibalism and is shocked. Later, when he is boasting about the modern weapons and warfare England has developed and how the press of a button could kill thousands, the African Tribe’s Chief asks him in wonder: “What do you do with all the people you kill?” The Brit is amused and says “Well, we mostly cannot find proper bodies after an attack but if we do find any, we give them a full military salute, medals and they are cremated with honour.” The Chief is disgusted and says “What a waste! We at least eat them! England must have too much food!”

Only, it is no more a joke.

Amul Girl & India Politics…

Nice cartoons. Borrowed from MINT. Creatives by DaCunha Agency.

Know Sonia Gandhi – Article by Dr. Subramanyan Swamy

I have known Dr. Subramanyan Swamy as a personality from the village next to mine, as a senior to one of my Uncles at the Indian Statistical Institute and as one of the intelligent, but often irrelevant politicians of India. For those who read my articles (1, 2) on the Nehru – Gandhi Dynasty (now into it’s 5thGeneration of representatives), you would be well-versed with some of the falsehoods on the foundation of which the current 10, Janpath stands.

This is the election time and am sure you will all wince reading what is written below in Dr. Swamy’s own words. But please make an exception this elections. Get this rotten dynasty out of India.

“Patriotic Indians should thank the then President of India, Bharat Ratna Dr. A. P. J. Abdul Kalam for having the courage by citing a legal hitch to dissuade Ms. Sonia Gandhi from staking her claim to form the Government in May 2004. She therefore did not as expected (which she later twisted to her favour by citing it as a sacrifice, when she actually had no choice!) on May 17th become the Prime Minister of 1 billion plus people of India. It can now be said that the nation has been saved from a monumental, devastating, and permanent injury to India’s national interest and patriotic psyche of Indians. And therefore every effort that can be made in a democracy should be made to ensure that Ms. Sonia Gandhi is permanently out of reckoning for any public office. For those who instinctively understand that, this Note is to explain the factual basis for this conclusion, and suggest what patriotic Indians can do now.

My opposition to Ms. Sonia Gandhi is not merely because she is Italian-born. In other democratic countries, including in Italy, such an issue [of foreign-born aspiring to be head of government] would not even arise at all because the issue has already been settled by law, that a person cannot hold the highest public office unless he or she is native born. In India there is no such law, but the President according to my knowledge, correctly acted on a proviso to Section 5 of the Indian Citizenship Act[1955] which empowers the Union Home Ministry to lay down conditions that apply to Indian citizenship acquired by foreigners by registration, which conditions would be based on the principle of reciprocity, viz., in Ms Gandhi’s case such of those conditions that apply to Indians on becoming citizens of Italy would apply to her. The President reportedly told her that if she insisted on being invited to form the government, he would want first to clarify, on a reference to the Supreme Court, whether in view of this proviso her appointment as PM could be successfully challenged in the court. It is fair to assume that this report of the President’s decision, is correct since the President had before him my petition dated May 15, 2004 making just that point- that Ms. Gandhi’s citizenship is conditional, and in particular she cannot be the PM legally. The President had also given me an appointment at 12.45 PM on May 17, 2004 to explain my submissions in person, which I did. I also told him that I would challenge such a constitutional appointment in the Supreme Court just as I had in 2001 when the Tamil Nadu Governor illegally swore in Ms Jayalalitha as Chief Minister. In that case, the Supreme Court had after hearing me and many other institutional luminaries, upheld my contention that mere majority in the House is insufficient for being sworn in to a constitutional office. There must be no disqualification as well. Ms. Jayalalitha had therefore to step down because she was disqualified by a conviction handed by a trial court in the TANSI corruption case filed by me as private complaint [she subsequently was acquitted by the Madras High Court, and hence became eligible the next year]. I also cited to the President a 1962 Allahabad High Court case, which held that this proviso in the Citizenship Act was binding and lawful.

The nation in the Sonia matter has thus got an unexpected but temporary reprieve, a reprieve received not only because her citizenship of India by registration is not equal to one by birth even by Indian law, but also a reprieve more because of what national security risk was averted. To comprehend that risk, we must first understand who Sonia Gandhi really is and what danger she, her family and her friends in Italy hold for India’s national security. Even for an Indian born citizen, we find it difficult to know a person’s true background, but for an Italian born it is extremely hard because of the remote access for most people to Italy in language and familiarity. This note is about that danger that Sonia represents to the nation, which the people need to know.

Ms. Sonia Gandhi’s background as is publicized by her and her Congress Party today, is based on three lies to hide the ugly reality of her life.

First, her real name is Antonia not Sonia. The Italian Ambassador in New Delhi revealed this in a letter dated April 27, 1983 to the Union Home Ministry which has not been made public. Antonia is Sonia’s real name in her birth certificate. Sonia is the name given to her subsequently by her father, Stefano Maino [now deceased] following his return from Russia where he had been a prisoner of war. Stefano had joined the Nazi army as a volunteer. Sonia is a Russian not Italian name. While spending two years in a Russian jail, Sonia’s father had become quite pro-Soviet; especially after the liberating US army in Italy had confiscated all fascists’ properties including his.

Second, she was not born in Orbassanoas she claims in her bio data submitted to Parliament on becoming MP, but in Luciana as stated in her birthcertificate. She perhaps would like to hide the place of her birthbecause of her father’s connection withthe Nazis and Mussolini’s Fascists, and her family’s continuing connections with the Nazi-Fascists underground that is still surviving since 1945 in Italy. Luciana is where Nazi-Fascist network is headquartered, and is on the Italian-Swiss border. There can be no other explanation for this otherwise meaningless lie.

Third, Sonia Gandhi has not studied beyond High School. She has falsely claimed in her affidavit filed as a contesting candidate before the Rae Bareli Returning Officer in the 2004 Lok Sabha elections, that she qualified and got a diploma in Englishfrom the prestigious University of Cambridge, UK. The truth is that Ms. Gandhi has never studied in any college anywhere. She did go to a Catholic nun run seminary-school called Maria Ausiliatrice in Giaveno [15 kms from adopted home town of Orbassabo]. Poverty those days forced young Italian girls to go to such missionaries and then in their teens go to UK to get jobs as cleaning maids, waitresses and au pair. The Mainos were poor those days. Her father was a mason and mother a share cropper. Sonia thus went to the town of Cambridge and first learnt some English in a teaching shop called Lennox School [which has since 1970 been wound up]. That is all her “education” is-learnt enough English language to get domestic help jobs. But in Indian society education is highly valued. Thus, to fool the Indian public, Sonia Gandhi willfully fibbed about her qualifications in Parliamentary records [which is a Breach of Ethics Rules] and in a sworn affidavit [which is criminal offence under IPC, severe enough to disqualify her from being MP]. In popular parlance, this is called 420 or 10 “numberi” [not to be confused with 10 Janpath].

These three lies indicate that Ms. Sonia Gandhi has something to hide, or has a hidden agenda for India. We need to find out more about her.

Ms. Sonia Gandhi upon learning enough English became a waitress in Varsity Restaurant in Cambridge town. She first met Rajiv when he came to the restaurant in 1965. Rajivwas a student in the University, but could not cope withthe academic rigour for long. So he had to depart in 1966 for London where he was briefly in Imperial College of Engineering as a student. Sonia too moved to London, and according my information, got a job with an outfit run by Salman Thassir, a debonair Pakistani based in Lahore, and who has a export-import company headquartered in Dubai but who spends most of his time in London. This fits the profile of an ISI functionary.

Obviously, Sonia made (or was given) enough money in this job to loan Rajiv funds in London, who was obviously living beyond his allowances [Indira herself expressed anguish to me on this score in late 1965 when she invited me to a private tea at the Guest House in Brandeis University]. Rajiv’s letters to Sanjay, who was also in London then, clearly indicate that he was in financial debt to Sonia because he requested Sanjay who obviously had more access to money, to pay off the debt.

However, Rajiv was not the only friend Sonia was seeing those days. Madhavrao Scindia and a German by name Stiegler are worth mentioning as other good friends of Sonia. Madhavrao’s friendship continued even after Sonia’s marriage to Rajiv. Scindia in 1982 was involved in a traffic accident near IIT, Delhi main gate while driving a car at 2 AM. Sonia was the only other passenger. Both were badly injured. A student of IIT who was burning midnight oil was out for a cup of coffee. He picked them up from the car, hailed an auto rickshaw and sent an injured Sonia to Mrs Indira Gandhi’s house since she insisted in not going to a hospital. Madhavrao had broken a leg and in too much pain to make any demand. He was taken to hospital by the Delhi Police who had arrived a little after Sonia had left the scene. In later years, Madhavrao had become privately critical of Sonia, and told some close friends about his apprehensions about Sonia. It is a pity that he died in mysterious circumstances in an air crash, which if investigated thoroughly, without biases, I am sure would eventually lead to startling revelations.

The circumstance under which Rajiv hastily married Sonia in a Church in Orbassano is controversial but that was his personal matter that has no public significance. But what is of public significance is that Indira Gandhi who was initially dead set against the marriage for reasons known to her, relented to hold a registry marriage with Hindu ceremonial trappings in New Delhi only after the pro-Soviet T.N. Kaul prevailed upon her to accept the marriage in “the larger interest of cementing Indo-Soviet Friendship”. Kaul would not have intervened unless the Soviet Union had asked him to.

Such has been the extensive patronage from the beginning extended to Sonia Gandhi from the Soviets. When a Prime Minister of India’s son dates a girl in London, the KGB which valued Indo-Soviet relations, obviously would investigate her and find out that she was the daughter of Stefano, their old reliable Italian contact. Thus, Sonia with Rajiv meant deeper access to the household of the Indian Prime Minister. Hence cementing the Rajiv-Sonia relations was in the Soviet national interest and they went to work on it. And they did through their then existing moles in the Indira Gandhi camp.

After her marriage to Rajiv, the Soviet connection with the Mainos was fortified and nurtured by generous financial help through commissions and kickbacks on every Indo,Soviet trade deal and defence purchases. According to the respected Swiss magazine, Schweitzer Illustrate [November 1991 issue], Rajiv Gandhi had about $ 2 billion in numbered Swiss bank accounts,which Sonia inherited upon his assassination. Dr. Yevgenia Albats, Ph.D [Harvard], is a noted Russian scholar and journalist, and was a member of the KGB Commission set up by President Yeltsin in August 1991. She was privy to the Soviet intelligence files that documented these deals and KGB facilitation of the same. In her book,The State Within a State. The KGB in Soviet Union, she even gives the file numbers of such intelligence files, which can now be accessed by any Indian government through a formal request to the Kremlin. The Russsian Government in 1992 was confronted by the Albats’ disclosure; they confirmed it through their official spokesperson to the press [which was published in Hindu in 1992], defending such financial payments as necessary in “Soviet ideological interest”. When the Soviet Union disintegrated in 1991, things changed for Ms. Sonia Gandhi. Her patrons evaporated. The rump that became Russia was in a financial mess and disorder. So Ms. Sonia Gandhi became a supporter of another communist country to the annoyance of the Russians.

The national security ramification of this ‘annoyance’ is now significant: The President of Russia today is Putin, a former dyed-in-the-wool KGB officer. Upon Dr. Manmohan Singh’s government taking office, Russia called back it’s career diplomat Ambassador in New Delhi and immediately posted as the new Ambassador a person who was the KGB station chief in New Delhi during the 1970s. In view of Dr. Albats confirmed revelation, it stands to reason that the new Ambassador would have known first hand about Sonia’s connections with the KGB. He may have in fact been her “controller”. The new Indian government which is defacto Sonia’s, cannot afford to annoy him or even disregard Russian demands coming from him? They will obviously placate him so as not to risk exposure. Is this not a major national security risk and a delicate matter for the nation?

Of course, all Indians would like good normal and healthy relations with Russia. Who can forget their assistance to us in times of need? Today’s Russia is the residual legatee of that Soviet Union which helped India. But just because of that, should we tolerate those in our government set up having clandestine links with a foreign spy agency? In the United States, the government did not tolerate an American spying for Israel even though the two countries are as close as any two countries can be. National security and friendship are as different as chalk and cheese.

In December 2001, I had filed a Writ Petition in the Delhi High Court with the photocopies of the KGB documents, and sought a CBI investigation, which the Vajpayee Government was refusing. Earlier, Minister of State for CBI, Vasundara Raje [now Rajasthan CM], on my letter dated March 3, 2001, had ordered the CBI to investigate. But after Sonia Gandhi and her party stalled the proceedings of Parliament on this issue, the then Prime Minister Vajpayee cancelled Vasundara’s direction to the CBI. The Delhi High Court issued a direction to the CBIto ascertain from Russia the truth of my charges. The CBI procrastinated for three years, and finally told the Court without an FIR registered the Russians will not entertain any such query. But who stopped the CBI from registering an FIR? The next hearing of the case is on September 8th.

After Sonia married Rajiv, she went about minting money with scant regard for Indian laws and treasures. Within a few years the Mainos went from utter poverty to billionaires. There was no area that was left out for the rip-off. On November 19, 1974, as fresh entrant to Parliament, I asked the then Prime Minister Ms. Indira Gandhi on the floor of the House if her daughter-in-law, Sonia Gandhi was acting as an insurance agent of a public sector insurance company [Oriental Fire " Insurance], giving the Prime Minister’s official residence as her business address, and using undue influence to insure all the officers of the PMO while remaining an Italian citizen [thus violating FERA]? There was uproar in Parliament, but Mrs. Indira Gandhi had no alternative but to cut her losses. She made a rare admission that it was so, and that it was by mistake, but that Sonia had resigned from her insurance agent status [after my question]. But Sonia was incorrigible. Her contempt for Indian law continued to manifest.

The Justice A.C. Gupta Commission set up by the Janata Party government in 1977 came out with a voluminous report on the Maruti Company then owned by the Gandhi family, and has listed eight violations of FERA, Companies Act, and Foreigners Registration Act by Sonia Gandhi. She was never prosecuted, but can be still prosecuted because under Indian law, economic crimes not subject to the statute of limitation. In January 1980, Indira Gandhi returned as Prime Minister. The first thing Sonia did was to enroll herself as a voter. This was a gross violation of the law, enough to cause cancellation of her visa [since she was admittedly an Italian citizen then]. There was some hullabaloo in the press about it, so the Delhi Chief Electoral Officer got her name deleted in 1982. But in January 1983, she again enrolled herself as a voter! Such is her revealed disdain for Indian laws and that is her mindset even today.
 
The bottom line observed in Sonia’s mindset is that she can always run back to Italy if she becomes vulnerable at anytime. In Peru, President Fujimori who all along claimed to be “born Peruvian”, faced with a corruption charge fled to Japan with his loot and reclaimed his Japanese citizenship.

In 1977, when the Janata Party defeated the Congress at the polls, and formed the government, Sonia with her two children, abandoned Indira Gandhi and ran to the Italian Embassy in New Delhi and hid there. Rajiv Gandhi was a government servant then [as an Indian Airlines pilot], but he too tagged along and hid in that foreign embassy! Such was her baneful influence on him. Rajiv did snap out Sonia’s influence after 1989, but alas he was assassinated before he could rectify it. Those close to Rajiv knew that he was planning set things right about Sonia after the 1991 elections. She did too know of it because he had told her. Ever wonder why Sonia’s closest advisers are those whom Rajiv literally hated? Ambika Soni is one such name. Ever wonder why she asked the President of India to set aside, on a mercy petition, the Supreme Court judgment directing that Rajiv Gandhi’s LTTE killers be hanged to death, when she was not similarly moved for Satwant Singh who killed Indira Gandhi or recently for Dhanajoy Chattopadhyaya? The explanation for this special consideration for the LTTE lies in what Rajiv had told her in 1990.

Those who have no love for India will not hesitate to plunder her treasures. Mohammed Ghori, Nadir Shah, and the British scum in the East India Company made no secret of it. But Sonia Gandhi has been more discreet, but as greedy, in her looting of Indian treasures. When Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi were Prime Ministers, not a day passed when the PM’s security did not go to the New Delhi, or Chennai international airport to send crates and crates unchecked by customs to Rome. Air India and Alitalia were the carriers. Mr. Arjun Singh first as CM, later as Union Minister in charge of Culture was her hatchet man. Indian temple sculpture of gods and goddesses, antiques, pichwai paintings, shatoosh shawls, coins, and you name it, were transported to Italy to be first displayed in two shops owned by her sister [i.e., Anuskha alias Alessandra]. These shops located in blue-collar areas of Rivolta [shop name: Etnica] and Orbassano [shop name:Ganpati] did little business because which blue collar Italian wants Indian antiques? The shops were to make false bills, and thereafter these treasures were taken to London for auction by Sotheby’s and Christies. Some of this ill-gotten money from auction went into Rahul Gandhi’s National way into the Gandhi family account in the Bank of America in Cayman Islands.

Rahul’s expenses and tuition fees for the one-year he was at Harvard, was paid from the Cayman Island account. What kind of people are these Gandhi-Mainos that bite the very hand of Bharat Mata that fed them and gave them a good life? How can the nation trust such greedy thieves?

Since I failed to persuade the Vajpayee government to defend India’s treasures from plunder by the Mainos, I approached the Delhi High Court in a PIL. The first Bench of the court issued notice to the Government, but since the Indian government dragged it’s feet, the Court directed the CBI to seek Interpol’s and Italian government’s help. The Italian government justifiably asked for a Letter Rogatory for which a FIR is a pre-requisite. But the Interpol did oblige and submitted two voluminous reports, which the Court directed the CBI to hand over to me. But CBI has refused, and has claimed privilege! The CBI has also been caught lying in court by telling the judges that Alessandra Maino is a name of a man, and Via Bellini 14, Orbassano is a name of a village [not the street address of the Maino's residence]. Although the CBI counsel had to apologise to the court stating he made a mistake, he has been promoted to Additional Solicitor General by the new government! The Vajpayee-Sonia mutual assistance pact is in full view. The case now comes up on September 8th.

But the most sinister aspect of Sonia Gandhi’s character is her connection withterrorists. I am still working on it, but she has had long connection with the Habash group of Palestinian, and has funded Palestinian families that lost their kith and kin in a suicide bombing or hijacking episode. This, Rajiv Gandhi himself told me and was confirmed to me [the funding] by Yassir Arafat when I met him in Tunis on October 17, 1990 at the request of Rajiv Gandhi. Rajiv Gandhi and I were good friends from 1978, but became very close buddies after V.P. Singh had betrayed him in 1987. We met practically every day, mostly in the early hours from 1AM to 4AM. It was at my suggestion that he made Chandrashekhar the PM. And contrary to public impression, he was not mainly responsible for the fall of Chandrashekhar government in which I was a Minister.

Besides the Palestinian extremists, the Maino family have had extensive business dealings with Saddam Hussein, and surprisingly with the LTTE ["the Tamil Tigers"] since 1984. Sonia’s mother Paola Predebon Maino, and businessman Ottavio Quattrocchiwere the main contacts with the Tigers. The mother used the LTTE for money laundering and Quattrocchi for selling weapons to earn commissions. Sonia’s conduit to the LTTE has been and is through Arjun Singh who uses Bangalore as the nodal point for contact. There is a string of circumstantial evidence pointing to the prima facie possibility that the Maino family may have contracted the LTTE to kill Rajiv Gandhi. The family may have assured the LTTE that nothing would happen to them because they would ensure it is blamed on the Sikhs or the evidence so much fudged that no court would convict them. But D.R. Karthikeyan of the CBI who led the SIT investigation got the support of Narasimha Rao and cracked the case, and got the LTTE convicted in the trial court, and which conviction was upheld in the Supreme Court.

Although on the involvement of Congress Party in the assassination, DRK soft peddled on a number of leads perhaps because he did not want political controversy to put roadblocks on his investigation as a whole. The Justice J. S. Verma Commission, which was set up as the last official act of the Chandrashekhar government before demitting office on June 21, 1991, did find that the Congress leaders had disrupted the security arrangements for the Sriperumbudur meeting. The Commission wanted further probe into it but the Rao government rejected that demand. In the meantime under Sonia’s pressure, the Jain Commission was set up by the Rao government, which tried to muddy the waters and thus exonerate the LTTE. But the trial court judgment convicting the LTTE came earlier, and that sinister effort too failed.

Nowadays, Sonia is quite unabashed in having political alliance with those who praise Rajiv Gandhi’s killers. No Indian widow would ever do that. My investigations into Sonia’s involvement in Rajiv’s assassination is therefore still on. I am also author of a best seller titled Assassination Of Rajiv Gandhi,Unasked Questions and Unanswered Queries [published by Konark in 2000] in which I have given some indications.

Is it not significant that the political career of Sonia Gandhi advances concomitantly with a series of assassinations and apparently accidental deaths? How did Sanjay’s plane nosedive to a crash and yet the fuselage not explode? There was no fuel! Why was there no inquiry conducted? Is it not a fact that Indira Gandhi died because of loss of blood from the wounds and not directly due to a bullet impacting her head or heart? Then is it not strange that Sonia had insisted that the bleeding Indira be driven to Lohia Hospital – in the opposite direction to AIIMS, which had a contingency protocol set up for precisely such an event? And after reaching Lohia Hospital, did not Sonia change her mind and demand that they all drive to AIIMS thus losing 24 valuable minutes. The same kind of mystery surrounds the sudden deaths of Sonia’s other political roadblocks such as Rajesh Pilot, Jitendra Prasad, and Madhavrao Scindia. Such things happened in the dark ages in Italy. Should we allow it India like dumb cattle?

What Can We Do? We have to ensure that the Maino clan does not stay in power. Dr. Manmohan Singh may be PM, which is a small relief, but he is not a fighter. The real power in government today is wielded by the Maino mafia gang. Can they be dethroned?

In Indian democracy, only a shocking scandal can unseat a government other than by losing majority. Today’s priority is not for toppling the Congress government as such since Manmohan Singh is a decent and scholarly person, but in driving the Maino clan out of India. It will however not be long before Sonia will give Manmohan Singh marching orders, and he will march out meekly. We should not expect him to resist. With Sonia’s defacto government in place, it is also unrealistic to expect that I can get an early victory in the courts on the KGB and antique smuggling cases.

The most potent weapon therefore to dislodge the Maino clan [including Rahul and Priyanka] is by exposing their Italian citizenship. In 1992, Sonia revived her citizenship of Italy under Article 17 of the Italian Citizenship Law [Act 91 of 1992]. Rahul and Priyankawere born Italian citizens because Sonia was Italian when she gave birth to them [Italian law based on jure sanguinis]. Hence, they continue be Italians since they never renounced it. Both have been traveling abroad on Italian passports. They may now acquire Venezuela passports since Rahul’s girl friend Veronica is a Venezuelan. That means one more foreign bahu for us tolerant Indians. The Maino-Gandhis are certainly getting globalized.

So what can patriotic Indians do? There is an urgent need to document these facts on notarized paper, for which we need a network in London, Milan, Hongkong and Venezuela. Those persuaded by my above stated facts and arguments may join in and help set up this network.