Why I Supported the Emergency

Khushwant Singh

Description

The Emergency has become a synonym for obscenity. Even men and women who were pillars of Emergency rule and misused their positions to harass innocent people against whom they had personal grudges try to distance themselves from their past in the hope that it will fade out of public memory forever. We must not allow them to get away with it, says Khuswant Singh, while fearlessly stating his own reasons for championing the Emergency. This bold and thought-provoking collection includes essays on Indira Gandhi s government, the Nanavati Commission s report on the 1984 riots and the riots themselves, as well as captivating pieces on the art of kissing and the importance of bathing. Alongside these are portraits of historical figures such as Bahadur Shah Zafar, General Dyer, Ghalib and Maharaja Ranjit Singh as well as candid profiles of the famous personalities he has known over the years, revealing intimate details about their lives and characters. From his reflections on Amrita Sher-Gil s alleged promiscuity to the experience of watching a pornographic film with a stoic R.K. Narayan, this is Khuswant Singh at his controversial and iconoclastic best. Selected and edited by Sheela Reddy, Why I Supported the Emergency: Essays and Profiles covers three quarters of a century. Straight from the heart, this is unadulterated Khuswant Singh.

Sujets

• Histoire
• Humanities
• History

Informations

• Publié par: Penguin Books Ltd
• Date de parution: 15 août 2015
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9788184752410
• Langue: English

Extrait

Khushwant Singh

WHY I SUPPORTED THE EMERGENCY
Essays and Profiles
Compiled and Edited by Sheela Reddy
Contents
About the Author
Introduction
Why I Supported the Emergency
On Iwe Fiction
On Being Buggered
On the Last Mogul
F*** All Editors
On the Maharajas
Utterly Butterly Verghese Kurien
R.K. Narayan
My Last Days in Lahore
On Sting Operations
A Hosanna to the Monsoons
Phoolan Devi: An Obituary
A Sardarji In Phoren
Qurratulain Hyder-Aunty Subjantiwalli
Nehru the Man
Sir Vidia
Amrita Sher-Gil
Me and my Filthy Lucre
Mrs G: The Wonder that was Indira
J.R.D. Tata
On Old Age
Mulk Raj Anand
Kamla Patel
Mother Teresa: The Greatest Indian
Nazrul Islam
On Kalam on the Eve of Becoming President
The Sikhs: Poets of Enterprise
Mahatma Gandhi
On the 84 Riots
Amrita Pritam: An Unstamped Ticket
Kasauli: My Mini Baikunth
Nirala: Poet, Lover and Madman
On Kissing
On the Nanavati Report
On Names
Ghalib
Bathing is Good for Your Soul
L.K. Advani
Mrinalini Sarabhai
Ranjit Singh
Sheila Dhar: Love Food, Will Sing
G.D. Birla
General Dyer
Firaq Gorakhpuri
On Great Talkers
Poetry with Dahi Bhallas
On Religion
Protima Bedi
M.A. Jinnah
A Requiem for Domsky
The Master Builder
Ali Sardar Jafri
Ye Ol Lady of Bori Bunder
Of Godmen and their Legacies
Kabir
Himachal s William Tell
Jack Wilberforce Burke Peel
Mir Taqi Mir
Aveek Sarkar
On Death And Dying
A Love Story: Dharma Kumar
On Emergency: The Diary of a Bureaucrat
Editor s Acknowledgements
Follow Penguin
Copyright Page
PENGUIN BOOKS
Why I Supported the Emergency
Khushwant Singh was India s best-known writer and columnist. He was founder-editor of Yojana and editor of the Illustrated Weekly of India , the National Herald and Hindustan Times . He authored classics such as Train to Pakistan, I Shall Not Hear the Nightingale and Delhi . His last novel, The Sunset Club , written when he was ninety-five, was published by Penguin Books in 2010. His non-fiction includes the classic two-volume A History of the Sikhs , a number of translations and works on Sikh religion and culture, Delhi, nature, current affairs and Urdu poetry. His autobiography, Truth, Love and a Little Malice , was published by Penguin Books in 2002.
Khushwant Singh was a member of Parliament from 1980 to 1986. He was awarded the Padma Bhushan in 1974 but returned the decoration in 1984 in protest against the storming of the Golden Temple in Amritsar by the Indian Army. In 2007, he was awarded the Padma Vibhushan.
Among the other awards he received were the Punjab Ratan, the Sulabh International award for the most honest Indian of the year, and honorary doctorates from several universities.
Khushwant Singh passed away in 2014 at the age of ninety-nine.
Sheela Reddy has been a journalist for over thirty years and knew Khuswant Singh for almost as long. She was the books editor of the leading news magazine Outlook , writing extensively on books, authors and the publishing business. Her writing has appeared in literary magazines and in several anthologies, including Penguin s First Proof and Chasing the Good Life.
Introduction
Fourteen years ago, when I was a reporter for the Asian Age , my editor, M.J. Akbar, sent me to interview Khushwant Singh. I had met Khushwant once years ago when I was trying to make a precarious living as a young freelance journalist. At that time I had duly pounded the pavements of Bahadur Shah Zafar Marg, better known in my circle of freshly arrived immigrants to Delhi as the Fleet Street of India. The first editor s door that I could get past was that of an unknown tabloid called the Sun . I had an article with me-on Barbara Cartland s visit to Hyderabad-that I had written and typed out. It was accepted and the editor asked me if I could also interview Khushwant Singh for the Sun . I had no idea why he wanted a feature on Khushwant Singh after Barbara Cartland, but I accepted the assignment with alacrity.
Khushwant was certainly easier to meet than Barbara Cartland, whose gatekeepers included a five-star hotel staff, the organizers of her event in Hyderabad and finally her husband s cold voice on the phone. Khushwant s number was listed in the telephone directory and he answered the phone himself. Come at four o clock today, he said briskly, without even asking which newspaper I was reporting for. It brought him down a little in my young rank-conscious eyes. He was already a legend by then, churning out his two weekly columns for over a dozen English and fifteen language dailies across the country. And these columns were collected into books almost as fast as he wrote them. Then, as now, you couldn t go to a single railway station, no matter how small, and not find a paperback written by him at the A.H. Wheeler stall. Another reason for my disdain was that my father, a retired railway engineer who read only newspapers, the Illustrated Weekly before it folded up and Perry Mason thrillers by Erle Stanley Gardner, read him religiously every week.
Khushwant opened the door himself, a barefoot, sloppy, bespectacled sardar with a beard dyed jet black, in shorts and a T-shirt that was once white but was now stained with what looked like ketchup but turned out to be the Pan Parag he chewed all day. He led me into his little den, which made me a little nervous: he had a reputation and I couldn t see if anyone else was in the house besides him. All four walls of the study were lined with books. Just as we settled down, he in a comfortably worn black leather sofa, his bare feet up on a moda, a servant arrived with a tray carrying two large mugs of tea and two or three generous slices of fruit cake. The cake was for me, Khushwant said, and deftly led me into my interview without wasting time on further preambles. I ve forgotten now what the interview was about, but I recall being lulled by his avuncular kindness into asking questions I wouldn t have dared to ask anyone else of his age and stature. He answered in very simple, plain words, with an openness I had rarely encountered, considering each question I put to him with a gravity that made me feel as if I was a veteran journalist instead of a cub reporter for an unknown tabloid, which, incidentally, closed down very soon after this incident. He waited till I d finished, before starting his own grilling: where was I from? Was I single or married? What did my parents do? And my husband? But his probing was very skilful, disguised under the cover of many amusing anecdotes and stories about people whom I d vaguely heard of even though they were from Hyderabad, the city where I grew up. I got the impression even then that behind his benign gaze, he didn t miss a thing. And I left feeling flattered by his rapt attention. I was convinced I had made a lasting impression on him.
Of course, when I interviewed him again, he had no memory of that meeting. He had changed very little in the twelve or thirteen years since I had last met him. He still answered his phone on the first ring, briskly saying, Come at four o clock, and he opened the front door himself for the photographer and me, offering us tea and biscuits before answering any questions. This time I was there to ask him his view on Rabindranath Tagore s writings. It was, to say the least, interesting-what an overrated writer the Nobel Laureate was, how underwhelmed he was by Tagore s poetry and novels, and how he was a mere songwriter, but no one dared to say so because Bengalis immediately took umbrage. He spoke in the unconcerned way I remembered from our first meeting, one bare foot up on the moda, as if he was saying something quite commonplace. He has this gift, even now, of saying something outrageous with the utmost sincerity. Nor did he look nervous, as politicians sometimes did when I noted down everything they said, wondering if they had been too outspoken. He was either too na ve to know the effect his words would have when they made the headlines, or he couldn t give a damn.
The next morning there was an uproar in Calcutta about what Khushwant had said, and angry letters poured in. My delighted editor sent me back for a follow-up, to try and squeeze the last drops out of the controversy. I was doubtful: surely, by now Khushwant would be repenting his off the cuff answers. Perhaps he would turn his rage on me for his own heedlessly uttered words, accusing me of misquoting him. But he was as genial as ever, unrepentant at the storm he had unleashed with his words. It made it easier to ask him for another interview that would rake over the coals. He rose gallantly to the challenge, pointing out that Tagore was among the four holy cows among Bengalis-the others being Subhas Chandra Bose, Bengali cuisine and I forget the last one, possibly Rabindrasangeet. To criticize any of these four holy Cs, he said, was to whip up a storm among Bengalis. I began to admire this curious old man: he had known all the time, while I was diligently taking down his words, the effect he would have in Bengal the next day and yet he didn t back off; he just strolled into battle with a careless laugh.
This time the impression I d made on him was less fleeting. When I called him again in a few weeks, he could not only recall my name but he also invited me to come at 7 p.m. Everyone in Delhi-or rather, everyone who read his columns-knew that 7 p.m. at E-49, Sujan Singh Park was his charmed hour when the high and mighty, famous and infamous, godmen and godless, writers, both aspiring and renowned, painters, dancers, scholars, visiting journalists from abroad and, of course, pretty women, rang the bell under the now famous signboard. This board has travelled with him since his paying guest days in Bombay: Please Do Not Ring the Bell Unless You Are Expected. They were invited in for a round or two of Scotch and soda and some conversation, both flowing generously until exactly an hour la