India is not Indira
People in the West should not be thought meddlesome or Patronising when they deplore what is now happening In India. Rather, their concern for the survival of Indian democracy should be taken as an implied tribute to thcfse Who established it and to the initial success of their experiment.
It is a trite fallacy that political freedom is only suitable to countries with a high standard of living and a high rate of literacy. India was proving that a nation largely consisting of poor, uneducated peasants could rnake a democratic system work. In Indian elections the Percentage turn-out was remarkably good, granted the Conditions, and the results were by no means a foregone Conclusion. Though one party retained power at the centre, there were changes of government in a number of the States which make up India's federal union.
Broadcasting—the most powerful medium of cornniunication in a country with mass illiteracy—was government-controlled, but the press was essentially f:ree. And liberty of the subject was buttressed by an Independent judiciary. Of course there was corruption— but that is not confined to poor democracies, and with a free press India had the means to expose it. Of course there was no spectacular improvement in the condition of the people, but how could there be when science was dramatically increasing the expectation of life? The failure to conquer poverty within a generation was due hot to free institutions but to the population explosion.
Mrs Gandhi's dictatorship, which she is seeking, in effect, to perpetuate by law, cannot be excused on grounds of necessity—the time-honoured pretext of tyrants. It is necessary only to her, not to India. Indeed, it is likely to destroy the nation's unity as well as its liberty, because a country as diverse as India will surely not be held together for long by an over-centralised despotism. Compared with the Raj that Mrs Gandhi is now establishing, the British Raj was loose and liberal, and it also had the advantage of seeming, because it was alien, to be impartial as between the different communities and linguistic groups in India.
Foreigners must be careful how they criticise, because xenophobia is easily aroused against them. But journalists everywhere have a duty to uphold freedom of the press, and there are brave people in India—notably C. R. Irani, of the Statesman—who are not abandoning the struggle and who deserve our support.
Leading politicians, on the other hand, should say whatever needs to be said privately. They will do no good by making speeches against Mrs Gandhi's regime, though they should certainly not—like Mr Eldon Griffiths, for instance—come out in its favour. Mrs Thatcher will be visiting India for a few days towards the end of this month, and it is to be hoped that she will speak tactfully but firmly to Mrs Gandhi, as one 'iron lady' to another. Mrs Thatcher will no doubt be keen to establish good personal relations with her host. But she could say without impertinence that the death of Indian democracy would be a blow for democrats everywhere.
