The Charlotte News

Wednesday, April 1, 1942

FOUR EDITORIALS

Site Ed. Note: Raymond Clapper tells on this date's editorial page of his visit with Nehru, putative leader of the Hindu three-quarter majority in India, as his party, the Indian National Congress, prepared to determine its position on acceptance or rejection of the British proposal conveyed by Sir Stafford Cripps, dominion after the war provided that the British retained control of national defense, in exchange for support in the war.

The front page indicates the Sikhs' rejection of the British proposal based on their fear that they would be overrun by Muslims in Punjab Province after the war. The Sikhs numbered about four million, about one percent of India’s total population, around four hundred million people at the time.

Mr. Clapper mentions that Nehru, future Prime Minister of India, was holding a wedding for his daughter Indira, who was marrying someone named Feroze Gandhi, no relation to Mohandas Gandhi--though Indira knew him because of her father’s close friendship with Mahatma.

Ms. Gandhi, of course, became the first female Prime Minister of India in 1966 and remained in that position until 1977. She was elected again in 1980 and served until she was assassinated in 1984.

She and her new husband served in the National Congress in 1942 and were arrested along with Mohandas Gandhi when they spoke out in opposition to the British proposal, favoring instead immediate sovereignty for India as part of the "Quit India" movement.

Gandhi’s term as Prime Minister ran into considerable trouble in 1975 when she was convicted of misuse of campaign funds and banned from serving in Parliament for six years. She was ordered to step down as Prime Minister, but refused and essentially declared martial law to eliminate her opposition. She was nevertheless defeated in a vote of confidence which she called in 1977.

Her assassination in October, 1984 came a month after she had ordered the army to clear the Sikh holy shrine in Punjab in order to break up a demonstration of militants seeking independence for Punjab, the same position favored by the Sikhs, and for the same reasons, which the front page this date in 1942 explains. In the ensuing raid on the shrine, numerous civilians were killed, estimates varying between 500 and 3,000. The assassination was carried out by two of Ms. Gandhi’s bodyguards, both Sikhs, on the grounds of her official residence.

"The farther one travels, the less one really knows..."

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