The Great Speeches of Modern India Read online

  Having overcome the trauma of Gandhi’s murder, India, the fledgling nation, turned towards building a modern polity, economy and society. The Constituent Assembly, the forum where many fine speeches were made, provided the framework of parliamentary democracy. The chairman of the drafting committee, B.R. Ambedkar, captured in his closing speech of the first assembly both the profound solemnity of the occasion and the responsibilities that had devolved on the leaders of the new republic. No leader was more aware of these responsibilities than Nehru. He embodied in his personality, his policies, the qualities of his leadership and above all in his speeches the hopes and aspirations of independent India. As the first Prime Minister, he was responsible for making democracy in India robust and viable, and for endowing the nation with a set of modern institutions.

  The 1950s were Nehru’s golden years, and it can be said without any undue exaggeration that his voice became the voice of India. He spoke for the nation and to the nation. Nehru was no demagogue but he had the ability to inspire, to capture the imagination of the nation. He had the rare gift of choosing the right words for an occasion. Only he could fuse together tradition and modernity by describing the Bhakra Nangal dam and other similar projects as the temples of the new India.

  The passing away of Nehru closed a chapter in the annals of India’s contemporary history. The style of the speeches, too, changed. Nehru and his contemporaries—and almost certainly the generation preceding him—had all written their own speeches. This cannot be said for the politicians of the post-Nehru era. Most, if not all, the major political figures from Indira Gandhi onwards had their own team whose members worked on the speeches and wrote them. Indian political leaders were part of a global trend. None of the great orators, during the Second World War and the period preceding it, employed speechwriters. Churchill wrote his own speeches and rehearsed them again and again. In the House of Commons, he was, as his biographer, Roy Jenkins, has remarked, ‘always a very note-bound speaker’. Across the Atlantic, President Roosevelt, it is recorded, took four hours to write his 1933 inaugural speech. Harking further back in time, it is inconceivable that the great orators in British parliament—Edmund Burke, Gladstone, Lloyd George—would allow someone else to write the speeches that they would deliver. John F. Kennedy was perhaps the first leading political figure to work with speechwriters. His first speechwriter was Theodore Sorensen who instructed the young president to follow Lincoln’s Gettysburg address as a model. Speech writing for Kennedy became a major operation with men like John Kenneth Galbraith, Adlai Stevenson, Arthur Schlesinger and others being solicited for drafts and suggestions. The age of the speechwriter had arrived. The age of the spin-doctors was not far away.

  In Indian politics, speechwriters are seldom seen or heard. It is thus never possible to know who exactly wrote a particular speech and the historian is forced to move from the realm of record to that of rumour. At various points of time, P.N. Haksar, Ashok Mitra, and P.N. Dhar wrote Indira Gandhi’s important speeches. But the person who wrote the most number of speeches for Indira Gandhi was probably Sharda Prasad who also performed the same service for Rajiv Gandhi. Sharda Prasad was once asked why he, who had seen two prime ministers at such close quarters, did not write his memoirs. He reportedly quipped, ‘a man can become a ghost, but a ghost cannot become a man.’

  The dependence on speechwriters may have had something to do with a change in the style of politics, but what is certain is that the quality of the speeches underwent a radical transformation. The speeches became more matter of fact. Those who have heard Indira Gandhi speak will agree that her speeches were not short on power but it came from her voice modulation and the passion she could bring to her speeches when the occasion demanded. The power of her speeches, thus, was not derived from the power of words. This was even more true of her son Rajiv Gandhi who, when he first came to public life, was a very poor speaker. He faltered, despite the best efforts of his closest friends, some of whom, the rumour goes, often wrote his speeches. But Rajiv Gandhi brought to Indian politics a freshness that was often reflected in what he said.

  The subject of the speeches in the post-Nehru epoch also underwent a change. Political leaders tended to concentrate more on governance and administration rather than on issues of nation-building which had provided the theme of some of Nehru’s best speeches. Indira Gandhi did occasionally stray to the problems of the environment or the changing role of women in Indian society, but these performances, when read today, appear a trifle lacklustre. In fact, the best speeches of the post-Nehru era came from people who were far away from politics. Two of these—one by Amartya Sen and the other by Satyajit Ray—have already been mentioned. Two others need to be noted. Vikram Seth’s speech was addressed to schoolchildren, a group that remains out of the focus of public life and debate, even though the children represent the future of India. Admittedly, Seth was speaking to the boys of India’s most elite school but the candid description of the unhappiness he felt at school and his advice to students, ever so gently imparted, will chime with many.

  India is a new nation with an ancient past. One of the problems that continues to elude Indian public life is the way that past can be linked to the present. The usual tendency is to either ignore the past or to glorify it. In his speech on Gautama Buddha, Gopal Gandhi speaks directly to Tathagata with the angst and the anguish of the present. Gautama’s sufferings and his own mode of coping with them acquire in Gopal Gandhi’s crie de coeur, a poignant contemporary resonance.

  There is one aspect without which any discussion of the speeches would be incomplete. This is the technological dimension. In the late nineteenth century, speeches were delivered without the aid of microphones. A booming voice was a necessary requirement for a good orator. The coming of the microphone was a major development since the smallest change in tone and voice modulation would now get magnified many times over. The next technological advance was even more significant for public speakers. Over the wireless, speeches were carried across to millions. Indira Gandhi’s speeches on Bangladesh and on the declaration of the Emergency were delivered over the radio. The impact of both was electrifying though in different ways. One boosted the morale of the nation and the other spread fear and apprehension. The coming of radio also meant that speeches were recorded for posterity. The advent of television took this forward: not only was the voice captured but every gesture, grimace and smile was captured on camera. There can be no doubt that these developments have made speech-givers more self-conscious. These technological developments, more importantly, have also enriched the archive of history. Science did not have the means of recording the gestures that Vivekananda had made during his Chicago address or the pitch that Tilak’s voice had registered when he spoke of swaraj but today television footage can tell us exactly what Sonia Gandhi did when she spoke of the dictates of her inner voice.

  An inescapable risk in preparing and editing a volume such as this one is the problem of choice and selection. The process is invariably subjective. The subjectivity is always tempered, however, by the knowledge of what one has not chosen. The plea of ignorance takes care of one part of the problem, the easier part in fact. I am sure there exist speeches of which I am unaware and therefore I have not included in this volume. But there are other speeches and other orators I know about that are absent from this volume. One significant absence is speeches made by communist leaders. Hiren Mukerji, for example, was a formidable orator. But many of his memorable speeches were made impromptu in the course of election campaigns and are thus lost to history. The speeches he made in the Lok Sabha—his debate with C.D. Deshmukh in Sanskrit has become the stuff of Lok Sabha lore—somehow, to this editor, did not carry the same power as texts to be read. This is also partially true of another Mookerjea—Shyamaprosad—who, it is said, made even Nehru quake whenever he spoke in the Lok Sabha. But while reading the many interventions he made in parliament, his speeches did not convey to me the emotions that he obviously invoked when he spoke.


  There is obviously a shadow between the power of oratory and the power of a text when it is read by subsequent generations. A distinction needs to be made between great speakers and great speeches. Great speakers do not always make great speeches. The yardstick for judging the latter is whether the words retain their power with the passing of time. Nehru was not a great orator in the traditional sense of the term, his voice was not loud and words did not come in a torrent as they do with great orators, he did not pause for effect but he made many memorable speeches and coined phrases that have become part of the nation’s vocabulary. We do not know if Vivekananda was a great orator but reading his Chicago address after more than one hundred years is still a stirring experience. Orators like Hiren Mukerji and Shyamaprosad Mookerjea, or to take another example, Tulsi Goswami (known in his time as the Demosthenes of Bengal) moved people by their rhetoric but not all their speeches when read today convey the same power. There is a disjunction somewhere between the power of speech when heard and the power of words when read. In this collection, for obvious reasons, the emphasis has been on the latter.

  Another problem in the selection process has been language. India had many powerful orators who spoke in their mother tongues—Atal Bihari Vajpayee is an obvious example. In this volume, I have included some translated speeches, but only where official and approved translations exist. Some of Vajpayee’s gems, unfortunately, have not fallen into this net. I am also aware that there are some important occasions that threw up speeches, which have not been presented in this collection. Readers will, I am sure, notice these and accept that this after all is a personal selection. The best that an editor can do is to appeal to the conscientious reader in the words of the greatest speech-maker in literature, ‘and after we will both our judgments join.’

  Part 1

  1880s–1947

  ‘Freedom is my birthright. So long as it is awake within me, I am not old. No weapon can dry this spirit, no fire can burn it, no water can wet it, no wind can dry it.’

  BAL GANGADHAR TILAK

  The opening of the Indian National Congress (Bombay, December 1885)

  WOMESH CHANDRA BONERJEE (1844–1906)

  By the 1880s, English educated Indians had formed themselves into two political camps. One around Surendranath Banerjea in Calcutta, and another around Alan Octavian Hume in Bombay. In 1885 Hume summoned the Indian National Congress in Bombay and W.C. Bonerjee, a highly successful barrister-at-law in Calcutta, was made the first president. Bonerjee was so anglicized that he had changed his family name, Banerjee. He later went to live and die in London, but wanted his last rites to be performed in Benares. His great rival in Calcutta politics was Surendranath, who could not attend the Congress because he received the invitation too late. Surendranath organized the Indian National Conference, which was merged with the Congress the next year at Hume’s behest. There was, in these initial years, a great deal of tension between the Bengal and Bombay delegates of the Congress. The former were not prepared to join, in the words of one member, ‘in the role of the hubble-bubble bearer (hukka-bardar) of anybody else.’ The aims and demands of the early Congress were moderate but its significance lay in the fact that it was the first all-India body established to articulate the grievances and demands of Indians. The Congress confined itself, in its early years, to petitioning the government to reform its un-British character by ending economic exploitation and racial discrimination. In this opening address, the message of loyalism stands out—the Congress was happy to be Her Majesty’s Loyal Opposition. Yet the Congress within a few years would spearhead the Indian national movement.

  It seems a fitting occasion for answering a question that had continually been asked in the outside world during the past few weeks, namely, what the objects and aims of this great national Congress really were. I would not pretend to reply to this question exhaustively. The ensuing proceedings would, I believe, do this more effectively than any single speaker could hope to; but I may say briefly, that the objectives of the Congress could for the most part be classified under the following heads:

  (a) The promotion of personal intimacy and friendship amongst the more earnest workers who further our country’s cause in the different parts of the Empire.

  (b) The eradication, by direct, friendly personal intercourse, of all possible race, creed, or provincial prejudices amongst all lovers of our country, and the fuller development and consolidation of those sentiments of national unity that had their origin in their beloved Lord Ripon’s most memorable reign.

  (c) The authoritative record has been carefully elicited by the fullest discussion of the matured opinions of the educated classes in India on some of the more important and pressing social questions of the day.

  (d) The determination of the lines upon, and methods by which, during the next twelve months, it is desirable for native politicians to labour in the public interest.

  Surely there is nothing in these objects to which any sensible and unprejudiced man could possibly take exception to. Yet, on more than one occasion remarks have been made by gentlemen, who should have been wiser, condemning the proposed Congress as if it was a nest of conspirators and disloyalists. Let him say once and for all, and this I know well after the long informal discussion we had among ourselves the previous day, that I am expressing the sentiments of every gentleman present, that there are no more thoroughly loyal and consistent well-wishers of the British government than myself and the friends around me. In meeting to discuss in an orderly and peaceable manner questions of vital importance affecting our wellbeing, we are following the only course by which the Constitution of England enables us to represent our views to the ruling authority. Much has been done by Great Britain for the benefit of India and the entire country is truly grateful to her for it. She has given us order, she has given us railways, and above all, she has given us the inestimable blessing of Western education. But a great deal still remains to be done. The more progress the people make in education and material prosperity, the greater would be the insight into political matters and the keener our desire for political advancement. I think that our desire to be governed according to the principles prevalent in Europe is in no way incompatible with our loyalty to the British government. All that we desire is that the basis of the government be widened and that the people should have their proper and legitimate share in it. The discussion that will take place in this Congress will, he believed, be as advantageous to the ruling authorities as, I am sure it will be, to the people at large.

  One country, two nations (Meerut, March 1888)

  SYED AHMED KHAN (1817–1898)

  The founding of the Indian National Congress had an immediate response from the Muslims. Men like Sir Syed Ahmed Khan, a Delhi-born employee of the British government who rose to the position of a subordinate judge and in 1875 founded the Muhammadan Anglo-Oriental College at Aligarh, saw the Congress as a body dominated by educated Hindus. Muslims had been slow to take to English education and this set them apart from those who were active in the Congress. Sir Syed argued that Muslims in India had their own identity and that their interests would be better served by cultivating the friendship of the British rather than allying themselves with the INC. This was the first time that this standpoint—that the Indian Muslim’s interests were separate from those of the Hindus—was publicly voiced and it would continue to be raised until Partition.

  I think it expedient that I should first of all tell you the reason why I am about to address you on the subject of to-night’s discourse. You know, gentlemen, that, from a long time, our friends, the Bengalis have shown very warm feelings on political matters. Three years ago they founded a very big assembly, which holds its sittings in various places, and they have given it the name ‘National Congress.’ We and our nation gave no thought to the matter. And we should be very glad for our friends the Bengalis to be successful if we were of opinion that they had by their education and ability made such progress as rendered them fit for the
claims they put forward. But although they are superior to us in education, yet we have never admitted that they have reached that level to which they lay claim to have attained. Nevertheless, I have never, in any article, or in any speech, or even in conversation in any place, put difficulties or desired to put difficulties in the way of any of their undertakings. It has never been my wish to oppose any people or any nation who wish to make progress, and who have raised themselves up to that rank to which they wish to attain and for which they are qualified. But my friends the Bengalis have made a most unfair and unwarrantable interference with my nation, and therefore it is my duty to show clearly what this unwarrantable interference has been, and to protect my nation from the evils that may arise from it. It is quite wrong to suppose that I have girded up my loins for the purpose of fighting my friends the Bengalis: my object is only to make my nation understand what I consider conducive to its prosperity. It is incumbent on me to show what evils would befall my nation from joining in the opinions of the Bengalis: I have no other purpose in view.

  The unfair interference of these people is this—that they have tried to produce a false impression that the Mohammedans of these Provinces agree with their opinions. But we also are inhabitants of this country, and we cannot be ignorant of the real nature of the events that are taking place in our own North-West Provinces and Oudh, however their colour may be painted in newspapers, and whatever aspect they may be made to assume. It is possible that the people of England, who are ignorant of the real facts, may be deceived on seeing their false representations, but we and the people of our country, who know ‘all the circumstances’, can never be thus imposed on. Our Mohammedan nation has hitherto sat silent. It was quite indifferent as to what the Babus of Bengal, the Hindus of these Provinces, and the English and Eurasian inhabitants of India might be doing. But they have now been wrongly tampering with our nation. In some districts they have brought pressure to bear on Mohammedans to make them join the Congress. I am sorry to say that they never said anything to those people who are powerful and are actually Raises and are counted the leaders of the nation; but they brought unfair pressure to bear on such people as could be subjected to their influence. In some districts they pressed men by the weight of authority, in others they forced them in this way, saying, the business they had at heart could not prosper unless they took part—or they led them to suppose that they could not get bread if they held aloof. They even did not hold back from offering the temptation of money. Where is the man that does not know this? Who does not know who were the three or four Mohammedans of the North-West Provinces who took part with them, and why they took part? The simple truth is they were nothing more than hired men. (Cheers) Such people they took to Madras, and having got them there, said: