Tavleen Singh - India’s Broken Tryst

INDIAS
BROKEN
TRYST

Tavleen Singh

HarperCollins Publishers India

CONTENTS

O n a Sunday morning some months after Sonia Gandhis government lost the general election, I was in my garden by the sea in a contemplative mood. Birds sang, butterflies danced in beams of soft sunlight and waves washed gently up against the garden wall. A blissful moment. So when my phone rang and I saw that it was one of Sonias devotees I let it ring. The caller was a former minister whom I had not spoken to in a long while. When it rang again I responded out of curiosity. The voice I had not heard in years began our conversation this way. I got the invitation for Aatishs book launch. Please congratulate him for me. I wont be able to come, alas, since I wont be in Delhi.

Oh, Im sorry, I said.

I will buy the book.

You should. I think its his best one yet.

By the way if you are wondering why we havent spoken in such a long whileYou were absolutely right about her.

Oh?

More than you can imaginemuch more than you can imagine.

Tell me.

Would you believe me if I told you that my problems with her began because after she made me a minister she and her children wanted me to do things that were in the interests of their friends and family but against the national interest?

Yes.

There were rules that I made towards achieving the stated goals of our party but I was forced to change them because some friend of Priyanka and Rahul would have been directly affected by the changes.

I am not surprised, I said, and now Sanjaya Baru and Natwar Singh have confirmed in their books that Sonia was Indias real prime minister.

True. Do you know that she called me in one day and yelled at me for several minutes because she objected to my friendship with youI was reduced to tears. The minister and I had been friends for more than thirty years.

We talked for almost an hour, at the end of which the ex-minister said, Ive told you these things in confidence. I hope you will respect my confidence because you know what she is capable of. So I will not reveal the ministers name. Our conversation on that perfect Sunday morning in my garden by the sea put into perspective things I had only suspected. Bad things had happened in my life and to people in my life under Sonia Gandhis reign.

Among these was a tax raid. It was aimed at Ajit and not me, but I sensed it had less to do with anything he had done and more to do with other factors. Months before my conversation with the ex-minister, when it was not completely clear that Narendra Modi would become Indias next prime minister, I was in this same house by the sea when it was raided. The raid was ordered by the Government of India and not the Government of Maharashtra. By then Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had retired behind his veil of silence and everyone with the smallest interest in politics knew that Indias real prime minister was Sonia Gandhi.

The raiders came on a Saturday. I had returned after a frenzied week of travel between Delhi and Jaipur. My friend Vasundhara Raje had been sworn in as chief minister of Rajasthan two days earlier, and I spent hours on the Jaipur road juggling column deadlines and the inaugural ceremony. So I came back with the hope of enjoying a restful weekend in our home in the seaside village of Kihim. Curled up in the study on a lounger I was watching something forgettable on television in a sleepy sort of way when I heard loud shouting from the courtyard below. Assuming that it must be some problem with the dogs, I continued to lie half asleep on my reclining chair. Suddenly a group of people that included one short woman burst into my tiny study and ordered me to go down at once. We are from the Government of India, they yelled menacingly, and you have to come down at once.

Who are you? I asked with some alarm, thinking for a moment that they could be local thugs.

Enforcement Directorate, they shouted, even more menacingly. Come down at once.

You go down and I will follow, I said, not sure if my clothes were in suitable array beneath the blanket under which I lay.

No, no. You will come down with us now, said the woman in a shrill, grating voice.

Okay, I said, standing up after adjusting my clothes. And because she was just ahead of me, I happened to touch her back as we were going down the stairs.

Dont touch me, she screeched. I am an officer of the Government of India.

I didnt touch you, I said firmly, by now sure that this was indeed a tax raid and that the inspectors would be hostile and ugly. I had been in a tax raid once before when another of Ajits homes in Mumbai was raided. Ajit and I have been life partners for thirty years, but since we are not married the raiders technically had no right to treat me as a suspect in the raid. But these are niceties they pay no attention to.

When we got to the veranda downstairs, I saw that the raiding party consisted of more than thirty people. They were nearly all men, but other than the short woman there were a couple of policewomen in plain clothes. When the raiders handed me a form listing my rights and obligations, I could have said that the house was not mine and that since Ajit was abroad they had no right to conduct their raid, but it would have been pointless. So I read the badly printed, government-issue form they set before me and drew attention to the rule that said I needed to be shown their identity cards before they proceeded further. They produced small, laminated cards in a flurry with a lot of noise and bluster, after which I said, All right then, go ahead and conduct your raid.

At this point the short woman started jumping around. Please use parliamentary language only.

What did I say wrong? I asked, genuinely puzzled.

You said bloody, she screamed.

I did not, I said indignantly. It is not a word I ever use. I was tempted to add that if I had used an abusive word, it would have been the F one but knew that there would be more hysterical screeching from the woman.

So the raiders set forth in small groups to look into every nook, cranny, floorboard, drawer and cupboard in a house that is built in such a way that it is impossible to conceal anything. They soon discovered this and became mellower in their manner, even allowing me to go into my gym and work out. Mid-workout I got a call from my son, and although there was a woman inspector parked by my treadmill to watch my every move, I managed to tell Aatish that there was a government inspection on and that I could not talk.

Clever creature that he is, he sensed what was happening and called my friend and neighbour in Kihim village, Uma Dubash, to tell her what he suspected. She and I were meant to have dinner in my house that evening, and I had been permitted by the raiders to call her and tell her that she could not come. But you mustnt tell her that you are being raided, they warned. Uma had personal experience of tax raids and knew that they could be a lonely, frightening business, so after her conversation with Aatish she drove straight over, clad in a Moroccan kaftan, with a toothbrush in her evening bag.

When they asked her who she was, she announced grandly that she was Uma, Princess of Morvi. And then sailed into the dining room, where we were in the process of having my jewellery valued by a government jeweller. When I saw this bejewelled, perfectly groomed and scented vision manifest itself so unexpectedly, I could hardly believe my eyes. I told her that I had never in our long friendship been more delighted to see her. Not only is Uma hard to scare, she has the unusual ability to retain a sense of humour in difficult situations.

A free jewellery evaluation, she said when she saw what was happening, then turning to the jeweller said sweetly, Could you please do mine when you have finished doing hers?