Ravi Rohmetra
Rajiv Gandhi was the elder son of Indira Gandhi and Feroze Gandhi, he was born on 20th August 1944 in a famous political family. His maternal grandfather Pandit Jawahar Lal Nehru played a stellar role in country’s freedom struggle and became independent India’s first Prime Minister. Her mother Indira Gandhi was also a first woman Prime Minister of India. His parents lived separately and Rajiv Gandhi was raised at his grandfather’s home where his mother lived. The first son of Indira Gandhi and Feroze Gandhi.
His father Feroze Gandhi, a key member of the Indian National Congress and was the Editor of the National Herald newspaper founded by Moti Lal Nehru in Allahabad. By the time of his father’s death Rajiv was away at a private boarding school for boys; initially at the Welham Boys School and later the Doon School, both located at Dehradun, Uttarakhand. He was sent to London in 1961 to study his A-Levels. In 1962 he was offered a place at Trinity College, Cambridge to study engineering. Rajiv Gandhi stayed at Cambridge until 1965 and left the University without a degree mainly because he did not appear in the final Tripos Examinations. In 1966, he was offered a place at the imperial College London. He again left imperial college after a year without a degree. In the January of 1965, he met Italian Antonia (Sonia) Maino in Varsity restaurant in Cambridge. Sonia was studying English at Lennox School of Languages (which was not associated with the University of Cambridge) Rajiv and Sonia were married in 1968 in India. Returning to India, Rajiv Gandhi became a professional Pilot with Indian Airlines. He remained aloof from politics despite his family’s political prominence. It was only following the death of his younger brother Sanjay Gandhi in 1980 that Rajiv entered politics. After Sanjay’s death in a plane crash in 1980. Rajiv reluctantly entered politics at the instance of his mother. He won his first Lok Sabha election in 1981 from Amethi-the erstwhile constituency of his brother. Soon he became the General Secretary of the Congress Party and subsequently became the President of the Youth Congress. After the assassination of Indira Gandhi in October 1984 he became the 6th Prime Minister of India at the age of forty years. He called for general elections in 1984 and riding on a massive sympathy wave led Congress to a thumping victory. Congress eighty percent of the seats in Lok Sabha and achieved its greatest victory since independence. The Congress party won 411 seats out of 542. He served as the Prime Minister of India from 1984 to 1989. As a Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi made a valuable contribution in modernising administration. He had the vision and foresight to see that information technology will play a key role in the 21st Century and worked actively to develop India’s capacity in this realm and played a key role in the introduction of computers in India
Economic Policy
He increased Government support for science and technology and associated industries and reduced import quotas taxes and tariffs on technology-based industries, defense and telecommunications. He introduced measures significantly reducing the License Raj, allowing business and individuals to purchase capital, consumer goods and import without bureaucratic restrictions. In 1986 he announced a National Policy on Education to modernize and expand higher education programmes across India. He founded the Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalaya System in 1986 which is a Central Government supported Institution that concentrates on the upliftment of the rural section of the society providing them free residential education from 6th till 12th Class. His efforts created Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Limited (MTNL) in 1986, and his public call offices, better known as PCOs, helped spread telephones in rural areas.
Foreign Policy
Gandhi began leading in a direction significantly different from his mother’s socialism. He improved bilateral relations with the United States long strained owing to Indira’s socialism and close friendship with USSR and expanded economic and scientific cooperation. During his state visit to the Soviet Union he met with Premier Nikolai Tikhonov, Andrey Gromyko of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Mikhail Gorbachev.
Security Policy
Rajiv authorized an extensive Police and Army campaign to contain terrorism in Punjab. A State of martial law existed in the Punjab State, and civil liberties, commerce and tourism were greatly disrupted. There are many accusations of human rights violations by Police officials as well as by the militants during this period. It is alleged that even as the situation in Punjab came under control. The Indian Government was offering arms and training to the LTTE rebels fighting the Government of Sri-Lanka The Indo-Sri-Lankan peace accord was signed by Rajiv Gandhi and Sri-Lanka President JR Jayawardene, in Colombo on 29th July 1987. The very next day, on 30th July 1987, Rajiv Gandhi was assaulted on the head with a rifle butt by a young Sinhalesenaval cadet named Vijayamunige Rohana De Silva, while receiving honour of guard.
The intended assault on the back of Rajiv Gandhi’s head however glanced off his shoulder through the embarrassed Sri-Lankan President Junius Richard Jayawardene initially attempted to pass off the bizarre assault as “Rajiv tripped a little and slightly lost his balance”. Rajiv Gandhi while enroute to New Delhi asserted to JN Dixit “of course, I was hit Rajiv’s Government also suffered a major setback when its efforts to arbitrate between the Government of Sri-Lanka and the LITE rebels back fired with his speech while addressing the joint session of the US Congress and India. He famously said, “India is an old country, but a young nation; and like the young everywhere, we are impatient. I am young and I too have a dream. “I dream of an India, strong, independent, self reliant and in the forefront of the front ranks of the nations of the world in the service of mankind”. While campaigning for elections in Sriperumbudur, Tamil Nadu, Rajiv Gandhi was assassinated on 21st May, 1991, by a suicide bomber belonging to LITE. Rajiv Gandhi’s last public meeting was Shiperumbudurm in a Village approximately 30 miles from Chennai. Tamil Nadu, were he was assassinated while campaigning for the Sriperumbudur Lok Sabha Congress candidate. At round 10:00 pm the assassin greeted him and bent down to touch his feet. She then exploded an RDX explosive laden belt attached to her waist-belt. The act of violence was repeatedly carried out by the liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam. Expressing their resentment over the formation. Indian Peace- Keeping Force. Rajiv Gandhi was posthumously awarded the highest national award of India, Bharat Ratna in 1991.
Follow our WhatsApp channel