The life of Lal Bahadur Shastri (1904-66), India’s second prime minister and successor of Jawaharlal Nehru, is the absorbing saga of a little man who, while suffering the regours of poverty in early life, rose to political eminence on the strength of moral principle. When Shastri died, he left no house, no land, and no money. But he did leave behind an example which is morally inspiring. In an age riddled with political corruption, his career of exemplary integrity possesses a special relevance for readers in contemporary India as well as abroad. Although Shastri’s tenure as Prime Minister lasted only nineteen months, it was a period of high excitement and drama. Under Shastri’s leadership India successfully fought a major war against Pakistan. This came as a tremendous boost to India after the China debacle three years earlier. The Indo-Pak war was followed by successful peace negotiations between the two countries at the famous Tashkent Conference, where, with the ink scarcely dry after all the momentous signatures, Shastri dramatically died of a heart attack. Several social and political issues of national importance and international interest emerged or found successful resolution during the time that Shastri held political power in Nehru’s cabinet, as well as when he took over the premiership of India. There was the Kamaraj Plan; the question of Nehru’s successor; the English-Hindi national language controversy; the problems of food scarcity and food grain imports; the Hazratbal episode of the stolen sacred relic from the shrine in Kashmir; the complicated diplomatic negotiations over Kashmir in the United Nations; the tangled web of tightrope relations with China, the USA and the USSR; the controversy and suspicion over the circumstances of Shastri’s sudden death; and finally the heroism and acclaim that came to Shastri. All this is recounted with vivid detail in the book, which also unearths and sets many facts right for the first time. This is the first and only biography for the general reader based on detailed and impeccable scholarship. The author of the biography, C.P. Srivastava, was Shastri’s personal aide for several years. He was with Shastri until the last day of his life in Tashkent. He collected a large number of original documents from the USA; he interviewed bureaucrats, politicians and diplomats who were associated with Shastri’s life and career; he traveled in Shastri’s footsteps within India and abroad; he consulted medical experts to ascertain the truth about Shastri’s death. The result is this superbly detailed and scholarly work which will be of interest not just to scholars of politics and history, but also to an informed lay audience of political leaders, activists, bureaucrats, and journalists.
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