Indira Gandhi Channeled by Karl Mollison 08Jan2019
Indira Gandhi née Nehru; 19 November 1917 – 31 October 1984)
She was an Indian politician, stateswoman and a central figure of the Indian National Congress. She was the first and, to date, the only female Prime Minister of India.
Indira Gandhi was the daughter of Jawaharlal Nehru, the first prime minister of India. She served as Prime Minister from January 1966 to March 1977 and again from January 1980 until her assassination in October 1984, making her the second longest-serving Indian Prime Minister after her father.
Gandhi served as her father’s personal assistant and hostess during his tenure as Prime Minister between 1947 and 1964. During her stay in Great Britain, Indira frequently met her future husband Feroze Gandhi (no relation to Mahatma Gandhi), whom she knew from Allahabad, and who was studying at the London School of Economics. The marriage took place in Allahabad according to Adi Dharm rituals though Feroze belonged to a Zoroastrian Parsi family of Gujarat. The couple had two sons, Rajiv Gandhi (born 1944) and Sanjay Gandhi (born 1946).Their marriage lasted 18 years, until Feroze died of a heart attack in 1960.
She was elected President of the Indian National Congress in 1959. Upon her father’s death in 1964 she was appointed as a member of the Rajya Sabha (upper house) and became a member of Lal Bahadur Shastri’s cabinet as Minister of Information and Broadcasting. In the Congress Party’s parliamentary leadership election held in early 1966 (upon the death of Shastri), she defeated her rival Morarji Desai, to become leader, and thus succeeded Shastri as Prime Minister of India.
Gandhi wrote: “I am in no sense a feminist, but I believe in women being able to do everything…Given the opportunity to develop, capable India n women have come to the top at once.” While this statement appears paradoxical, it reflects Gandhi’s complex feelings toward her gender and feminism. Her egalitarian upbringing with her cousins helped contribute to her sense of natural equality.
As Prime Minister, Gandhi was known for her political intransigency and unprecedented centralization of power. She went to war with Pakistan in support of the independence movement and war of independence in East Pakistan, which resulted in an Indian victory and the creation of Bangladesh, as well as increasing India’s influence to the point where it became the regional hegemon of South Asia.
Citing fissiparous tendencies and in response to a call for revolution, Gandhi instituted a state of emergency from 1975 to 1977 where basic civil liberties were suspended and the press was censored. Widespread atrocities were carried out during the emergency. In 1980, she returned to power after free and fair elections. After Operation Blue Star, she was assassinated by her own bodyguards and Sikh nationalists on 31 October 1984.
In 1999, Indira Gandhi was named “Woman of the Millennium” in an online poll organized by the BBC.