Indian history textbooks treat Nehru as someone who didnt do any wrong, a status that is accorded equally to Gandhi. That the nehru-gandhi dynasty has had a stranglehold on the government has only helped extend that perception. The image of him as the benevolent leader, striving for the good of his people, has been encouraged through movies as well. Reading his Discovery of india, he comes across as someone very comfortable with the idea of india and its people on an intellectual level but not too much at home on an emotional level. He gets his message across when it comes to the plural nature of indian society and ability of democracy to serve and further it. He is also very convincing when it comes to reasons behind his preference of scientific thinking and attitude over religion in public and private life. I was surprised to see him offer an opinion to the effect that science at some point will encroach on the playing field of religion and be successful at it.
However, his clear thinking becomes muddled when he analyzes international alliances and capabilities and weaknesses of countries. The effects of suffering under colonial rule shows up in most of his views. He showers china with profuse praise that comes across as nothing more than naivete, with very little basis in realism. It might have been idle speculation at that time but his refusal to see china for what it was and not allow asian camaraderie to color his opinion is surprising. He compares america and russia and somehow points to russia as the vanguard of the new age even though he sees dynamism and strength of america as hope for future. He rightly sees european nations as nothing more than feuding economies who were bent on destruction. However, he prefers to gloss over(or worse still, justify some excesses and curtailing of liberties) in soviet union at that time while at the same time, finding fault with communists in india for their rigidity. To my knowledge, there wasnt much difference between the communism followed in russia and india at that time.
Some selected quotes,
On democracy for India
"I was prepared to trust that wide electorate far more than a restricted one, based on a property qualification or even an educational test. The property qualification was anyhow bad; as for education it was obviously desirable and necessary. But I have not discovered any special qualities in a literate or slightly educated person which would entitle his opinion to greater respect than that of a sturdy peasant, illiterate but full of a limited kind of common sense."
On drawbacks of religion
"Religion, as I saw it practised, and accepted even by thinking minds, whether it was Hinduism or Islam or Buddhism or Christianity, did not attract me. It seemed to be closely associated with superstitious practices and dogmatic beliefs, and behind it lay a method of approach to life's problems which was certainly not that of science. There was an element of magic about it, an uncritical credulousness, a reliance on the supernatural."
"Religion merges into mysticism and metaphysics and philosophy. There have been great mystics, attractive figures, who cannot be easily disposed of as self-deluded fools. Yet mysticism(in the narrower sense of the word) irritates me; it appears to be vague and soft and flabby, not a rigorous discipline of the mind but a surrender of mental faculties and a living in a sea of emotional experience. The experience may lead occasionally to some insight into inner and less obvious processes, but it is also likely to lead to self-delusion."
"But I do not believe in any of these or other theories and assumptions as a matter of religious faith. They are just intellectual speculations in an unknown region about which we know next to nothing. They do not affect my life, and whether they were proved right or wrong subsequently, they would make little difference to me."
"Spiritualism with its seances and its so-called manifestations of spirits and the like has always seemed to me a rather absurd and impertinent way of investigating psychic phenomena and the mysteries of the after-life. Usually it is something worse, and is an exploitation of the emotions of some over-credulous people who seek relief or escape from mental trouble. I do not deny the possibility of some of these psychic phenomena having a basis of truth, but the approach appears to me to be all wrong and the conclusions drawn from scraps and odd bits of evidence to be unjustified."
"Buddhism and Jainism were certainly not Hinduism or even the Vedic dharma. Yet they arose in India and were integral parts of Indian life, culture and philosophy. A buddhist or Jain in India is a hundred per cent product of Indian thought and culture, yet neither is a hindu by faith. It is, therefore, entirely misleading to refer to Indian culture as Hindu culture."
"It has always seemed to me a much more magnificient and impressive thing that a human being should rise to great heights, mentally and spiritually, and should then seek to raise others up, rather than that he should be the mouthpiece of a divine or superior power."
"Looking at scripture then as a product of the human mind, we have to remember the age in which it was written, the environment and the mental climate in which it grew, the vast distance in time and thought and experience that separates it from us. We have to forget the trappings of ritual and religious usage in which it is wrapped, and remember the social background in which it expanded. Many of the problems of human life have a permanence and a touch of eternity about them, and hence the abiding interest in these ancient books. But they dealt with other problems also, limited to their particular age, which have no living interest for us now."
On benefits of science
"Often, as I look at this world, I have a sense of mysteries, of unknown depths. The urge to understand it, in so far as I can, comes to me; to be in tune with it and to experience it in its fullness. But the way to that understanding seems to me essentially the way of science, the way of objective approach, though I realise that there can be no such thing as true objectiveness. If the subjective element is unavoidable and inevitable, it should be conditioned as far as possible by the scientific method."
"Yet I am convinced that the methods and approach of science have revolutionized human life more than anything else in the long course of history, and have opened doors and avenues of further and even more radical change, leading up to the very portals of what has long been considered the unknown. The technical achievements of science are obvious enough: its capacity to transform an economy of scarcity into one of abundance is evident, its invasion of many problems which have so far been the monopoly of philosophy is becoming more pronounced."
On Soviet Union
"The practical achievements of the Soviet Union were also tremendously impressive. Often I disliked or did not understand some development there and it seemed to me to be too closely concerned with the opportunism of the moment or the power politics of the day. But despite all these developments and possible distortions of the original passion for human betterment, I had no doubt that the Soviet Revolution had advanced human society by a great leap and had lit a bright flame which could not be smothered, and that it had laid foundations for that new civilization towards which the world could advance. I am too much of an individualist and believer in personal freedom to like overmuch regimentation. Yet it seemed to me obvious that in a complex social structure individual freedom had to be limited, and perhaps the only way to read personal freedom was through some such limitation in the social sphere. The lesser liberties may often need limitation in the interest of the larger freedom."
To me, he comes across as an idealist whose enduring legacy would always be the vision of democratic india that protects its minorities, guarantees free expression, strives to treat all religions equally(in spite of their harmful effects on people) and allows its people to determine who represents them. No less is his success in establishing institutions that are the pillars of democracy. His faults include his foreign policy debacles, his blind trust on goodwill of china and economic choices. I am grateful Nehru became the leader of a free india instead of Gandhi. He comes across as a leader India was lucky to have even though we are still paying for some of his faults.
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