Word: indira
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Varun Gandhi is the great-grandson of Jawaharlal Nehru, the country's first Prime Minister. His grandmother was Nehru's only child, Indira Gandhi, whose two sons, in turn, left legacies at odds with each other. The older son Rajiv, succeeded his mother as prime minister shortly after she was assassinated in 1984. Rajiv was later murdered in a 1994 terrorist bombing and his Italian-born widow, Sonia, now leads the ruling Congress Party. Rajiv's younger brother, Sanjay, however, had been their mother Indira's favorite and had been viewed as her heir apparent until his sudden death...
...current political firestorm started as Varun was preparing to make his political debut in India's general elections, which are now less than three weeks away. The young man seemed to be consciously raising one of the most controversial episodes in modern India's history: Indira Gandhi's Emergency Rule from 1975-1977, when she - with Sanjay as her chief advisor - ran the country on authoritarian lines, ruling by decree. One of those edicts led to forced sterilization to deal with India's then huge population growth rate. Varun Gandhi allegedly referred to it in his virulent rallies...
...political perspective but that his name and actions besmirch that of the great Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, who was assassinated by a Hindu extremist in 1948. While the Mahatma was not a blood relation of the Nehrus, a popular story has the philosopher of political non-violence, who was Indira's godfather, allowing her fiance, a young Zoroastrian lawyer originally called Feroze Shah Ghandy, to restyle his surname as Gandhi, thus attaching prestige to a mixed marriage many Hindus would not have approved of. Priyanka Gandhi, Sonia's daughter, said that her cousin Varun's comments were against the traditions...
...year following the division of Pakistan and India. Whole communities of Sikhs, Hindus, and Muslims were slaughtered, and the streets of Delhi ran with blood, as William Dalrymple writes in his history of the city, “City of Djinns.” In 1984, when Indira Gandhi was assassinated by her Sikh bodyguards after ordering a raid on the religion’s holiest shrine to evict the militants holing up there, the citizens of Delhi formed mobs and the violence ended with several thousand Sikhs dead...
Manekshaw's winning strategy began with patience. As army Chief of Staff, he advised Prime Minister Indira Gandhi to wait rather than intervene after a declaration of martial law in East Pakistan threatened to destabilize the region. He organized a coordinated army, air force and navy offensive that began on Dec. 3, 1971, and repeatedly went on the radio to warn the West Pakistani troops that they were surrounded. Overwhelmed, their commander surrendered within two weeks. The subsequent Simla Accords eventually led to the creation of Pakistan and Bangladesh. Shortly before he retired in January 1973, Manekshaw became field marshal...