Rajkumari Amrit Kaur: The princess who built AIIMS

 On February 18, 1956, the then minister of health, Rajkumari Amrit Kaur, introduced a new bill in the Lok Sabha. She had no speech prepared. But she spoke from her heart. “It has been one of my cherished dreams that for post graduate study and for the maintenance of high standards of medical education in our country, we should have an institute of this nature which would enable our young men and women to have their post graduate education in their own country,” she said.

The creation of a major central institute for post-graduate medical education and research had been recommended by the Health survey of the government of India, a decade ago in 1946. Though the idea was highly appreciated, money was a concern. It took another 10 years for Kaur to collect adequate funds, and lay the foundation of India’s number one medical institute and hospital.

Kaur’s speech in the Lok Sabha sparked a vigorous debate in the house over the nature of the institute. But the bill moved fast, gaining the approval of members of both the houses, and by May that year, the motion was adopted.The All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) was born. “I want this to be something wonderful, of which India can be proud, and I want India to be proud of it,” said Kaur, as the bill was passed in the Rajya Sabha.

In the past few months, as India has been battling a global pandemic, the role of the country’s apex medical body has come under discussion on several occasions. Significantly, it is the first prime minister of the country, Jawaharlal Nehru, who is credited for the heights reached by AIIMS. It is true that AIIMS came to be under the Nehru government. However, the real driving force behind it was Kaur.

A princess of the Kapurthala princely state, a student at Oxford university, a devout follower of Mahatma Gandhi, and an important member of the Constituent Assembly, Kaur was all of this and much more. Members of her family like to remember her as someone who believed in simple living and high thinking. The pages of history, on the other hand, celebrates her determination to drive out the British, her feminist zeal, and also the many contributions she had made to the health infrastructure of the country.

The Kapurthala princess

As a member of the Kapurthala princely family, Kaur had an interesting history. Her father, Raja Sir Harnam Singh, had converted to Protestant Christianity after a chance meeting with a Bengali missionary named Golakhnath Chatterjee in Jalandhar. Singh went on to marry his daughter, Priscilla, and had ten children with her. Kaur, the youngest among them was born on February 2, 1889.Kaur, therefore, was brought up as a Protestant Christian. After spending her early years in India, she was sent off to England for her education. “Princess Amrit Kaur was as much a product of Edwardian England as she was of India,” suggested her obituary in the New York Times in 1964. She completed her schooling from the Sherborne School for Girls, in Dorset, and then went to study at Oxford University. Thereupon, she returned to India in 1908 at the age of 20, and embarked on a life of nationalism and social reform.

“It is important to note that though a devout Christian, she was very much against missionary activities,” says Siddhant Das (27), great grand nephew of Amrit Kaur, and an entrepreneur who is currently living in Chandigarh, but spends most of his time doing research on her life and career. “She was a zealous patriot who believed that missionaries were alienating Indians from their cultural roots,” he explains.

The Gandhian and social reformer

Upon her return from England, Kaur was immediately drawn towards the ideas of nationalism, as she interacted with leaders like Gopal Krishna Gokhale and Mahatma Gandhi. She was mesmerised by the teachings of Gandhi, and shared an enduring, special friendship with him, as is evident from the collection of letters shared between the two, that have been compiled in the book, ‘Letters to Rajkumari Amrit Kaur’.

“What drew me to Bapu was his desire to have women in his non-violent army and his faith in womankind. This was an irresistible appeal to a woman in a land where women were fit for producing children and serving their lords as masters,” she is quoted as having said by American philosopher Richard Gregg in his introductory note in ‘Letters to Amrit Kaur.’

Though she wanted to join the naionalist movement soon after she returned, her family was against her involvement in the struggle, and therefore she kept away till her father passed away in 1930. During this period though, she was actively involved in social reforms particularly those related to women. Consequently, she waged a battle against the purdah system, the devadasi system, and child marriage. In 1927, she helped in the founding of the All India Women’s Conference and later served as its president.

By 1930, as she joined the Gandhian movement, she was imprisoned for her participation in the Dandi march. She gave up all her princely comforts to join Gandhi at his ashram in Sabarmati. “I remember Rajkumari sitting at the spinning wheel and eating along with other ashramites, the simple fare prescribed by Gandhiji,” wrote political activist Aruna Asaf Ali about her fondest memory of Kaur. “Rajkumari Amrit Kaur belonged to a generation of pioneers. They belonged to well- to-do homes but gave up on their affluent and sheltered lives and flocked to Gandhiji’s banner when he called women to join the national liberation struggle,” she added.

In her battle for a free India, she became one of the few women members of the Constituent assembly. She along with Hansraj Jivraj Mehta were the only female members to be ardently in support of the uniform civil code in the constitution.

The passionate health minister who created AIIMS

Nihar Mahindar Singh, the 58-year-old grand niece of Kaur, recalls that as a child she would visit Kaur’s house in New Delhi frequently, as she was getting treated at AIIMS. “I never received any preferential treatment for being her family member. I remember spending hours at a stretch on the corridors of AIIMS. I didn’t even know back then that aunt B (as Kaur was referred to in her family), had created the hospital,” she says, adding that it was much later, and by word of mouth from her family members that she learned of her grand aunt’s contribution in building AIIMS.

As an institute of healthcare and medical research, AIIMS had to have some unique features. To begin with, it was the first of its kind in Asia to prohibit doctors from private practise of any kind. Secondly, the doctors at AIIMS were to devote their time not only to treating patients and teaching, but also to carry out research. “All the staff and students were to be housed in the campus of the Institute in the best traditions of the Guru-Sishya ideal to stay in close touch with each other,” writes V. Srinivas, the deputy director of administration at AIIMS in his article, ‘The making of AIIMS: The parliamentary debate’.

As health minister, Kaur was the pivotal force in ensuring the unique status enjoyed by AIIMS. Yet, it is worth noting, that she was in fact not the first choice of Nehru to be part of the cabinet. “In August 1947, for the woman member of the cabinet, Nehru thought of Hansa Mehta, but took Rajkumari Amrit Kaur at Gandhi’s insistence,” writes author Sankar Ghose, in his book, ‘Jawaharlal Nehru – A Biography’. Writing about why Kaur was not preferred, he explains, “she was sometimes indiscreet and intemperate in her criticism of Congressmen.”Nonetheless, Kaur went on to become India’s first health minister. When the issue of funds for AIIMS came up, it was she who was instrumental in acquiring a huge amount from the New Zealand government. Over the years, she rallied around and was successful in getting donations from international bodies like the Rockefeller foundation, and the Ford foundation, as well as from the government of Australia, West Germany, as well as from the Dutch government.

During its diamond jubilee celebrations at AIIMS, Srinivas wrote a feature on Kaur for the Press Information Bureau (PIB), wherein he emphasised that Kaur protected the autonomous nature of the institute and ensured that an international face was created for it. “Rajkumari Amrit Kaur’s vision envisaged selection of students for admission to the under-graduate MBBS course in AIIMS is made after an open advertisement, on the results of an open competitive test, strictly on merit with equal opportunities to students from any part of the country,” he writes. It was her efforts, therefore, that led to entrance examinations being conducted for admission at AIIMS from 1956.

By 1961 itself, AIIMS had attained global repute as it was placed alongside the best of institutes from America, Canada and Europe.

Kaur chaired her last governing body meeting of AIIMS on August 14, 1963, wherein she donated her residence at Shimla, Manorville, to AIIMS as a space meant for the relaxation and recreation of the doctors and nurses of the institute.

Apart from passionately laying the foundation of AIIMS, she also founded the Indian Council of Child Welfare and became its first president. She was president of the Indian Leprosy Association, the Tuberculosis Association, and vice-president of the International Red Cross Society. She led the Indian delegation to the World Health Organisation (WHO) for four years and was president of the WHO assembly in 1950.

Her largest campaign as health minister though, was against Malaria. “At the height of the campaign, in 1955, it was estimated that 400,000 Indians who otherwise would have died had been saved by mitigation of malaria in their districts,” says the NYT obituary.

Earlier this year, Kaur was listed by TIME magazine as the woman of the year 1947. In noting her achievements and contributions, the magazine writes, “In leaving her life of luxury, Kaur not only helped build lasting democratic institutions, she also inspired generations to fight for the marginalized.”

Written by Adrija Roychowdhury

Source: Indian Express, 27/08/20

India needs to revisit M S Golwalkar’s life and teachings to realise its potential

India has seen varying shades of the lives of ascetics. These great men did not live merely for themselves but dedicated their being to society and humanity. Golwalkar is among the foremost symbols of such a selfless life.

Many in India observe February 19 as a day to commemorate a true patriot and one of India’s greatest intellectuals — Madhav Sadashiv Golwalkar.

Golwalkar, fondly remembered as Guruji, dedicated his life to the awakening of nationalistic sentiments rooted in the philosophy of Swami Vivekananda, Ramakrishna Paramahansa and Sri Aurobindo. Guruji made an unforgettable contribution to society and nation-building, going on to live as an ascetic.

India has seen varying shades of the lives of ascetics. These great men did not live merely for themselves but dedicated their being to society and humanity. Guruji is among the foremost symbols of such a selfless life. His entire journey is a tale of the umpteen sacrifices and contributions towards nation-building. Born in 1906, Guruji completed his Masters from Banaras Hindu University (BHU) with a first division. He then took admission in a Chennai institute for research. He was, however, compelled to give up on his research midway because of financial constraints. Subsequently, he began teaching in BHU and soon he became famous as Guruji. While Golwalkar taught at BHU, Pandit Madan Mohan Malviya remained deeply attached to him.

Guruji studied law as well but he remained unhappy with society’s mental weaknesses and the fact that India continued to remain a British colony. It was because of this sadness that Guruji moved towards spirituality under the guidance of Swami Akhandananda, who was a disciple of Ramakrishna Paramahansa. Under Swami Akhandananda’s guidance, Guruji learnt the true meaning and essence of sacrifice and detachment.

He realised that while many sacrifices are acceptable in the Indian tradition, the sacrifice of one’s duty is considered a sin. The real sacrifice, Guruji realised, was foregoing ego and personal desires. In 1937, Guruji was formally ordained by Swami Akhandananda. The same year, Swami Akhandananda gave up his body.

Golwalkar found Keshav Baliram Hedgewar as the ideal person to take forward the Sangh’s work of national and social awakening. Golwalkar said of Hedgewar, “The work of the Sangh head is to prepare swayamsevaks who have the best of characters along with a commitment towards the work assigned to them. They must also be ready to sacrifice their entire lives for the nation. Dr Hedgewar was one who could mould hearts in this way. In the beginning, I only found him to be a leader who worked differently. But later, I realised that he was an image of love, who existed in all three roles of mother, father and guru for his swayamsevaks.”

Guruji was deeply influenced by Hedgewar’s beliefs that while rousing speeches can give us short-term benefits, in the long term, the work of nation-building wasn’t possible without showing humility in speech. So, it is our duty to work for the nation by exercising a strict control over what we say and keeping intact a tenderness of heart and mind.

Guruji was also influenced by Sri Aurobindo’s teaching that for the creator of the universe, Ma Bhagwati, we must become virtuous souls who can spread love and positivity. From this perspective, his nationalism wasn’t one that had ego or tried to rule over people with the use of force. It was a cultural nationalism imbued with spirituality. This nationalism aimed at raising the self-confidence of its people, ushering them to become the best version of themselves and taking India back to its days of glory, when it was the global leader.

He concurred with Vivekananda and Aurobindo that the country wasn’t merely a piece of land or a synonym for political power. She is the mother who nurtures us. In modern times, if we try to understand Guruji’s philosophy, we find that he was imploring us to become the best version of ourselves for the betterment of our country. In Indian tradition, the human being is not supreme. Excellence lies in giving one’s best to the nation. Being grateful to the nation is of prime importance. This should never translate into low self-esteem or weakness.

Guruji considered staying united and powerful to be in the interest of the nation. His understanding of life was immersed in sound logic even as he remained a steadfast idealist. He believed in creating institutions based on the need of the hour and rejected traditions based on superstitions and those that were devoid of logic.

His views on patriarchy are reflected in the incident where his parents told him that what would happen to their lineage if he renounces worldly life despite being their only son. To this, Guruji said that he didn’t believe in the end of family dynasties. He said his aim was the welfare of the society.

Guruji rejected the Varna system as an outdated idea. He was a large-hearted, fearless nationalist. He believed the real worship of God was in human deeds. He did not believe in religious and caste divides. He believed that national unity and integrity lay in people respecting the national mission, goals and cultural symbols.

India today, more than ever, needs to revisit Golwalkar and his teachings to realise its full potential.

This article first appeared in the print edition on February 18, 2020 under the title “Ascetic nationalist”. The writer is national general secretary, BJP and a Rajya Sabha MP.

Source: Indian Express, 18/02/2020

VP Menon: An unsung hero of modern India

He left a rich legacy — expanding suffrage, pushing federalism, and, of course, integrating princely states

On a sunny spring day in 1914, a young Malayali walked into the Government of India’s summer offices in Gorton Castle (in the then Simla). Nobody knew who Vappala Pangunni Menon was then. He was all of 19-years-old, and he came with nothing but a letter recommending him for a typist’s job in the home department. Over the course of the next four decades, VP — as he would come to be known — would be at the frontline of India’s progress towards Independence. He was the principal typist of the Montagu-Chelmsford Report. In 1924, he would join the Reforms Office, a branch of the government of India, which would shepherd India along the path to self-governance. He would remain with the Reforms Office until 1947.

Today, VP Menon is remembered for being Sardar Vallabhbahi Patel’s right-hand man, for assisting in the integration of the princely states into the Indian Union. But, between 1914-1951, VP’s contributions to modern India were both immense and immensely understated.

In 1930, a trip (his first overseas) as part of the secretariat to London for the First Round Table Conference brought home to VP the importance of the ongoing

suffragette movement. Five years later, when he was working on the electoral rolls for the upcoming provincial elections of 1937, VP would give women — including those whose marriages had been dissolved — the right to vote. He would also provide a space for the multitudes of India’s uneducated on the voters’ list, by providing symbols and coloured boxes on ballot papers and insisting that provincial governments lower their educational standards for the average voter.

His was the voice that ensured the inclusion of such diverse clauses as the enfranchisement of the residents of India’s numerous railway settlements, and the estimation of the representatives from urban and rural areas. He was in his mid-forties then, and alone, for the first time, at the helm of constitutional change in the country. It is a contribution that has got lost in the dryness of the technicalities of constitutional semantics, but it deserves to be richly highlighted.

This was just the beginning.

The exposure to debates around a prospective federal future for the country gave VP the idea that India would do well as a federation. He would, in fact, put forward three plans for the transfer of power from the Raj to an independent India — in 1936, in 1941, and in 1946. Each plan hinged on one concept: A unified, federal India could well be achieved if the Centre took defence, foreign affairs and communications from the princely states, and left all the other powers with the royal houses. It would mean no extreme humiliation for the princes, but it would allow the overall authority to be held by the Government of India. Two different Viceroys heard his plan — and each time, the plan was shelved. It would be June 1947 before the Menon Plan for Indian Independence would finally see the light of day.

The constant thwarting of his ideas never prevented VP from trying to save India from the Partition. He strongly believed in trying to get all the political stakeholders at the same table in order to stitch together a coalition. The last desperate stab at this came in 1945, when VP pushed the then viceroy, Lord Wavell, into calling, what would become known as the Simla Conference. The failure of the conference is generally attributed to the clash of the personalities and egos that sat around the table in the Viceregal Lodge in Simla. But it is not well-known that VP Menon was the man who not only laid out the blueprint of the conference but insisted that it was Wavell’s duty to try to gain a political consensus about the future of India.

In the summer of 1947, India’s last Viceroy, Lord Mountbatten, would give his Reforms Commissioner and Constitutional Advisor six hours to hammer out a plan that would mollify both the Congress and the Muslim League, and potentially change the map of South Asia. By nightfall, VP had chain-smoked his way through endless cartons of cigarettes, and did exactly that. He would remember thinking that it read “passably well”, but his main concern was his grammar.

Patel would turn to VP in 1947, insisting that only VP would do as his secretary in the newly-established Ministry of States. To Patel has gone the credit for the integration of India, yet it is VP Menon’s signature on every Instrument of Accession. He was an invaluable asset to the Sardar. His knowledge of India’s constitutional lore was both intimate and unparalleled. He deployed a unique mix of charm and ruthlessness when it came to the princes. The Raja of Sarila, watching VP at an assembly in Nowgong in 1948, was amazed at the power that this short, stocky man in his open-toed slippers and safari suit was capable of exuding.

In 1951, following the death of the Sardar, Vappala Pangunni Menon slipped into political and professional obscurity, where he remained until the end of his days in 1966. Today, it is only right that we rectify this.

Narayani Basu is the author of VP Menon: The Unsung Architect of Modern India. She is also Menon’s great-granddaughter

Source: Hindustan Times, 10/02/2020

When ‘the Earth Laughs in Flowers’: A tribute to Monika Ghurde

Last year in Delhi, I hitched a ride with a friend to a poetry reading. He stopped en route to pick up another friend – a visitor from Goa, he said.

In the dark, I could barely see the petite woman who joined us. But as she entered, the car was suffused with a heady fragrance. While I am no perfume connoisseur, even I could tell this was exceptional. If I didn’t feel obliged to play nit-picking poet about my choice of adjective, I’d have termed it breathtaking. The word today is ironic.

“What perfume is that?” I remember asking.

“One that I made,” said a soft voice from the backseat. And I turned around to see a woman with an utterly radiant smile. That was my first encounter with Monika Ghurde. There are many reasons why I haven’t forgotten it.

It is not often that one meets someone who looks, quite simply, as lovely as their perfume. Monika did. She had the luminosity of a woman who has come into her own, whose laughter is not the easy giggle of youth, not the practiced smile of the social networker, but the hard-won, reclaimed mirth of a born-again, self-possessed adult.

It somehow seemed appropriate that I should meet her after inhaling her perfume. It felt like that first olfactory encounter gave me access – a password, as it were -- to the person she was.

Poetry is the most distilled verbal art I know. When you meet someone who has read your poetry with any degree of immersion, it feels like you both have a shortcut to a deeper, more authentic self. If the perfumer’s art is the ultimate in distillation, it is not surprising that I felt I had, in some way, accessed Monika’s happiest, truest version of herself.

In the next half hour, I sensed several things about her: refinement, warmth, curiosity, generosity, a disarming simplicity. Monika was not a woman on the make. That, for me, was the loveliest thing about her.

We spent the rest of the evening with each other. In a noisy bar, surrounded by people we didn’t really know, we talked about our histories with Mumbai, our love of Goa, her vocation as a perfumer, my poetry. The details are hazy. But by the end of the evening, Monika Ghurde was a friend.

As someone who believes friendship takes years of shared experience, I am surprised by my own use of the word. And yet, I’d use it again. She suggested meeting the next day. I couldn’t make it, but I knew that Monika and I would find ways to be in touch.

There comes a time when some people use their life experiences to subtract superfluous identities, and become who they fundamentally are. For me, that was the scent of Monika – the scent of naturalness. She didn’t talk of her achievements or her antecedents. She didn’t drop names. She simply seemed happy in her own skin. And so, I knew her without really knowing very much about her. The ‘about’ seemed irrelevant. I wanted to be in touch with Monika because of Monika.

In fact, the only antecedents we discussed were floral. I remember asking her about raat ki rani, my favourite fragrance. She told me it belonged either to the family of jasmine or the Persian tuberose – a detail I have never forgotten.

I met her again last December at a literary festival in Goa. We spent time on the lawns of the Goa International Centre, with fellow writer, Mahesh Rao. I have a photo she sent of that evening of the three of us, arms entwined. She is in the centre in a cream sari, laughing her warm infectious laugh.

‘Breathtaking’ was the first adjective I associated with her. If medical evidence were given the last word, that would also be the last. For her breath, we are told, was taken from her – brutally.

But facts are for newspapers. The truth about Monika Ghurde is different. And I hold fast to that truth: that the fragrance of crushed flowers lingers a long time after the horror and the prurient public gaze subsides, long after the last news reports are done and dusted. That is the strength of vulnerability. That is the strength of flowers.

What is the point of a perfume or a poem, really? None at all. Except that our lives are hugely impoverished without them. And precisely because there is no single point, they are not so easily erased.

There are no easy goodbyes, Monika. But the earth laughs in flowers, the poet Emerson told us. When we’re done with grieving, my radiant friend, we’ll join you in those places of enchanted distillation you knew how to delight in. We’ll join you in the laughter.

(This is one of several women-authored pieces published this weekend in tribute to Monika Ghurde.)

Source: Hindustan Times, 30-10-2016