Current Events :
LT GEN TS SHERGILL PVSM
After my premature retirement from Corps of Engrs Engineers, I got golden opportunity to render my services for construction of Tehri Dam under Tehri Hydro Development Corporation India Ltd(THDCILTD) FOR GENERATION OF 2400 M W power. Mission achieved with the help of Indian Engineers and 30 Russian experienced Engineers.
22% of Uttarakhand is in highlandslide prone zone due to fragile mountains so one has to be very careful for construction of such underground powerhouses as THDCILtd did. Same technique is being adopted now for highway road construction by the other organization as given more details below.
The Char Dham highway project is 75% completed. Remaining likely to be completed by the end of 2026. The 900km project links Yamunotri, Gangotri, Kedarnath and Badrinath. 🇮🇳🙏
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The Armed Forces Tribunal (AFT) has held that a recruit cannot be held responsible for withholding information about his name figuring in a criminal case, of which he was not aware of, if the police verification report at the time of recruitment is clear.
The Tribunal has directed the Army to reinstate a soldier who was recruited in 2021 and dismissed from service in 2023 after an adverse report from the district magistrate stated that a case under various sections of the Indian Penal Code for rioting, damage to public property and intimidation was registered against him in 2017 and the same was under consideration in court.
“We find that offence of the applicant for not disclosing the information of his involvement in civil / criminal case in enrolment form during his recruitment in the Indian Army is of a trivial nature as the applicant was not actually aware about such pending criminal case against him because the character certificate dated 22.02.2021 issued by the office of Senior Superintendent of Police before his recruitment in the Army reflects non-involvement of the applicant in any civil/criminal case in police records,” the Tribunal’s Bench comprising Justice Suresh Kumar Gupta and Maj Gen Sanjay Singh ruled in their order of November 2.
The soldier was enrolled in the Indian Army in April 2021. In October 2021, the adverse verification report from the district magistrate was received by the Army, following which he was served a show-cause notice in December 2021.
In his reply, he claimed that he was not aware of the registration and pendency of any such criminal case against him. He said that during the recruitment process, he had done his police verification online and as per the character certificate issued in February 2021, nothing adverse was found against him.
In March 2025, the accused in the case, including the soldier, were exonerated. After getting a certified copy of the judgment, he approached the Army for reinstatement in service, but it was denied on grounds that he had already been discharged.
Placing reliance on earlier judgements, the Tribunal held that the approach should be to condone minor indiscretions made by young people rather than to brand them as criminals for the rest of their lives.
The Bench observed that the criminal case against the applicant was decided by the Court of Civil Judge/Judicial Magistrate, Chandauli, vide order dated March 1, 2025, and the applicant was exonerated of the charges. “Therefore, the unintentional suppression of such material facts at the time of enrolment can be ignored and in view of the aforesaid judgments of the Apex Court and Allahabad High Court,” the Bench said.
Holding that the case of the applicant is considerable and the applicant is liable to be reinstated into service, the Bench set aside the order of discharge. The Bench directed that he be reinstated into service in the same rank/post from which he was discharged, and though he would not be entitled for any back wages for the period he was not in service, his original seniority and parity with his batch mates will be maintained.
In a major milestone for Sikh heritage conservation, Gurdwara Chhevin Patshahi Sri Guru Hargobind Sahib on Temple Road in Lahore, Pakistan, reopened on Sunday after remaining closed and neglected for nearly 79 years following Partition.
The historic shrine, associated with Guru Hargobind, the sixth Sikh Guru, was formally inaugurated after extensive restoration and reconstruction work by Pakistan’s Punjab Minister for Minority Affairs Sardar Ramesh Singh Arora and Evacuee Trust Property Board additional secretary (shrines) Nasir Mushtaq.
The gurdwara is believed to stand at the site visited by Guru Hargobind (1595-1644), revered in Sikh history as the warrior-saint who strengthened the community’s ability to resist religious oppression. The shrine was among the Sikh religious sites left in Pakistan after Partition and was abandoned following the migration of the Sikh population from the region.
Speaking to The Tribune, Arora, who is also the president of the Pakistan Sikh Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee, said members of the Sikh community offered prayers at the gurdwara for the first time following the completion of the restoration work.
“On the auspicious occasion of Bandi Chhor Divas, dedicating this historic Sikh shrine was our way of spreading a message of love, freedom, brotherhood and religious harmony in Pakistan. It was a proud moment for the global Sikh and Punjabi community that we were able to preserve this sacred heritage,” he said.
“It was unfortunate that after Partition, this historic shrine could neither be properly maintained nor made operational,” he said.
Arora said the restoration formed part of the Punjab government’s efforts to identify and preserve neglected Sikh shrines across Pakistan.
“It is a step forward in preserving Sikh heritage under a special programme aimed at promoting religious tourism, as envisioned by Pakistan’s Punjab Chief Minister Maryam Nawaz. We have identified 45 to 50 gurdwaras across Pakistan that have direct historical significance to Sikhism. These sites will be preserved as Sikh religious heritage and dedicated to the Sikh community,” he said.
Nasir Mushtaq said the restoration had been a practical demonstration of respect for the religious sentiments of Sikhs and the initiative was aimed at preserving historical heritage while promoting interfaith harmony.
It is believed that Guru Hargobind stayed for three days at the Lahore residence of a devotee, Bhai Jiwan, after accepting an invitation from the local Sikh congregation. Bhai Jiwan later converted his house into a gurdwara.
The shrine is also associated with Bhai Bidhi Chand, the renowned Sikh preacher and military commander, who, it is said, had stayed there during visits to Lahore while recovering horses seized by the Mughals. The horses had been offered by devotees to Guru Hargobind.
The original structure is believed to date back to the era of Maharaja Ranjit Singh. The Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee had assumed administrative control of the shrine in 1927.
Regular religious services at the gurdwara ceased after Partition in 1947, and the shrine remained closed for nearly eight decades before being restored and reopened to the Sikh community.
More than four decades after the 1984 anti-Sikh riots, Congress Parliamentary Party chairperson Sonia Gandhi has acknowledged that justice has largely eluded the victims despite four commissions, nine committees and two special investigation teams being constituted to probe the violence. She also admitted that Congress workers were among those accused of instigating or directing the violence that folllowed the assassination of former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi.
In her memoir, Belonging: A Journey of Love, released on Tuesday, Sonia also refers to criminal cases against RSS members, questions the administration’s failure to stop the massacre and recounts the delay in deploying the Army as mobs killed more than 2,000 Sikhs in Delhi alone.
The memoir also reveals an alleged plot to kill the entire Gandhi family during Diwali celebrations a week before Indira’s assassination on October 31, 1984, and Sonia’s desperate attempt to prevent Rajiv Gandhi from becoming Prime Minister, fearing that he would be the next target.
Revisiting one of the darkest chapters in independent India’s history, Sonia writes that several individuals, many of them Congress members, faced criminal proceedings for allegedly instigating or directing the 1984 violence. Cases were also registered against RSS members who participated in the killings, she says.
Of the hundreds of FIRs registered, four or five led to the arrest of Congress workers, according to her account. Even after successive inquiries, several cases continued to drag on in courts. Sonia acknowledges that the failure to punish those responsible for communal violence has been a systemic problem that successive governments have been unable to resolve. She also maintains that the massacre did not reflect any deep-rooted hostility between the Congress and the Sikh community, pointing to the party’s subsequent electoral victories in Punjab. Her account of the riots also examines the conduct of Rajiv, who was sworn in as Prime Minister hours after his mother’s assassination.
Sonia writes that Rajiv appeared on national television on the night of October 31 and appealed for peace. He visited areas affected by violence and asked his staff to locate their Sikh colleagues and ensure their safety. On November 1, Rajiv again went out to meet people, urging them not to seek revenge. The following day, he issued another nationwide television appeal condemning arson, looting and murder.
But Sonia also acknowledges that the government machinery had come under severe strain, with the police unable to control violent crowds. She writes that some officials appeared to have looked the other way while others may even have encouraged the violence.
Sonia writes that Army Chief Gen AS Vaidya received orders on the night of Indira’s assassination, but the family subsequently heard that he had decided against immediately mobilising nearby Army units because they were manned by Sikh soldiers. This was against the backdrop of sporadic mutinies involving Sikh soldiers after Operation Blue Star in Gurdaspur, Ramgarh, Pune and Jammu.
Instead, Army units were ordered to move from Dehradun. According to Sonia, the troops began entering Delhi on the night of November 1 and were positioned in affected areas by noon on November 2. Curfew and shoot-at-sight orders were imposed, while civil society groups established relief camps for survivors.
Sonia also recalls that several Sikh families fleeing the violence found refuge in the Gandhi household. Some had already experienced the trauma of Partition, having fled Pakistan to rebuild their lives in India. Yet, she admits, she was initially too overwhelmed by Indira’s murder and fears for Rajiv and her children to fully comprehend the suffering around her. It was five years later, in riot-hit Bhagalpur in Bihar, that the enormity of the violence struck her.
In 1989, Sonia accompanied Rajiv to Bhagalpur despite warnings from their security personnel. Their aircraft landed at a small airstrip, where an angry crowd surrounded them before allowing them to proceed to a nearby hospital.
What she witnessed there left her shaken. The injured, mostly women and children, were lying on the floor because the beds were full. Women with deep wounds pleaded with her to locate their missing relatives. Children cried in terror or clung to their injured mothers.
Sonia recalls repeatedly stepping aside to regain her composure before approaching the next group of victims. She writes that the experience forced her to confront the horrors of communal violence and question whether her own grief over Indira’s assassination had overshadowed her understanding of the atrocities committed against the Sikhs in Delhi in 1984.
On the flight home, she could no longer hold back her tears. The memoir also revisits attempts by successive Congress-led governments to introduce legislation against communal violence, including the 2005 and 2011 Bills.
Sonia writes that the proposed laws faced opposition mainly from the BJP and the RSS, but also from Left and regional parties, which argued that existing laws were adequate and that the legislation would undermine the federal structure by interfering with the states’ responsibility for law and order. She expresses disappointment over the failure of the legislation and alleges that communal violence, lynchings, social media and partisan governance have since combined to worsen the situation.
From the assassination of Akali leader Sant Harchand Singh Longowal on Rajiv Gandhi’s birthday to the bombing of Air India Flight 182 that killed all 329 people on board, Congress Parliamentary Party chairperson Sonia Gandhi has revisited the Khalistan movement and the turbulent years of militancy in Punjab during late 1980s, revealing how Rajiv sought to restore peace while confronting a series of terrorist attacks and political setbacks.
n her memoir, Belonging: A Journey of Love, released on Tuesday, Sonia recalls Rajiv’s determination to resolve the Punjab crisis following Operation Blue Star and Indira Gandhi’s assassination in 1984, his negotiations with the Shiromani Akali Dal and his instructions to security forces during Operations Black Thunder I and II in 1986 and 1988.
She writes that immediately after taking office, Rajiv faced serious unrest in Punjab, Assam, Mizoram, Tripura and the Darjeeling hills. He was prepared to sacrifice the Congress’s political interests to secure peace, even persuading elected Congress governments in some states to step aside in favour of their opponents.
“It does not matter who wins and who loses. What matters is the lamp of democracy is not extinguished: what matters is that India wins,” Rajiv had said in Parliament, according to the memoir.
Sonia writes that Rajiv was particularly determined to find a political solution to the Punjab crisis after the violence surrounding Operation Blue Star and his mother’s assassination.
The agreement appeared to offer a way out of the prolonged unrest. But less than a month later, Longowal was assassinated. Sonia recalls that August 20, Rajiv’s 41st birthday, was traditionally a family occasion. She would prepare his favourite food, while Rahul and Priyanka helped with the arrangements. A birthday cake and Kashmiri sweet rice were part of the celebrations.
That evening, the family had barely sat down for dinner when a staff member entered and handed Rajiv a note. “Sant Longowal has been killed,” Rajiv announced, before leaving abruptly for his office.
Sonia recalls that the family was left staring at their plates, unable to continue eating. Rahul and Priyanka repeatedly asked what had happened and what would follow. “We must wait till Papa comes back and explains,” she told them.
She writes that she feared the assassination was not merely a tragedy but also a warning directed at Rajiv. Longowal had been shot at point-blank range by Sikh militants and died before reaching hospital, Rajiv later told her.
Sonia says Rajiv was deeply disturbed by the killing, which he believed was intended to sabotage the accord he had worked so hard to secure.
The memoir also revisits the June 1985 bombing of Air India Flight AI 182, which was travelling from Toronto to Delhi via London. All 329 people aboard the Boeing aircraft were killed, including more than 80 children and members of 29 entire families. Many passengers were Canadians of Indian origin whose relatives lived in Punjab.
Sonia writes that the bombing was the deadliest terrorist attack involving an aircraft at the time and remained so until the September 11 attacks in the United States in 2001. A second bomb, intended to explode on another Air India flight, detonated on the ground at Japan’s Narita airport, causing further casualties.
She identifies Babbar Khalsa, a Khalistani terrorist organisation seeking an independent state of Khalistan through violence, as responsible for the Flight 182 bombing, while recalling that the investigation and legal proceedings in Canada continued for years.
The memoir also refers to the transistor bomb blasts in Delhi and adjoining states in May 1985, which killed 50 people and injured many others.
Several suspected Khalistani supporters were arrested, but the prosecution collapsed after 35 years of proceedings. Sonia notes that the court criticised the investigation as “defective, lop-sided, unfair, suffering from various lacunae”.
The police were also reproved for their “faulty investigation”. She links the outcome to the wider problem of delayed and unsuccessful delivery of justice in India.
Another major blow came in August 1986 when former Army chief General AS Vaidya, who had led the Army during Operation Blue Star, was assassinated in Pune after his retirement. His wife, who was accompanying him, was wounded.
Sonia writes that the Khalistan Commando Force carried out the assassination. She recalls that Vaidya had maintained that there was no distinction between fighting a foreign enemy and fighting those who took up arms against their own country and its Constitution.
The killing, she writes, devastated his wife and three daughters. The memoir then turns to Operations Black Thunder I and II, launched in 1986 and 1988 after armed Khalistani militants again occupied the Golden Temple complex. Sonia writes that Rajiv was determined to avoid a repetition of Operation Blue Star, when the Army had intervened after a prolonged confrontation.
He cleared the security operations but imposed two firm conditions: security forces were not to enter the Golden Temple complex, and every possible effort had to be made to avoid casualties. The first operation was completed in one night in 1986, while the second continued for nine days in 1988.
According to Sonia, the circumstances had changed by then. Public support for the Khalistan movement had begun to decline, and security forces were closely monitoring movements in and around the temple premises.
Rajiv remained personally involved in supervising the operation and was constantly occupied with meetings and telephone conversations with officials. Sonia recalls that the 1988 siege was televised live on Doordarshan to prevent rumours and misleading reports.
Security forces maintained a prolonged blockade, preventing movement into and out of the complex. As supplies ran out, the militants came under increasing pressure. Pilgrims held hostage inside gradually began emerging.
Eventually, the militants surrendered, walking out with their hands raised as the country watched the proceedings on television. Sonia writes that there were no casualties during the first operation, while 41 militants were killed in the second.
She recalls watching the final hours of the 1988 siege with Rahul and Priyanka, relieved that the operation had ended. The memoir presents the Punjab peace process as part of Rajiv’s broader effort to settle regional conflicts through negotiations, political accommodation and security measures.
Sonia also acknowledges that Rajiv could have made errors in judgement or action during his five years as Prime Minister, while defending his intentions and commitment to the country. She recalls accompanying him to remote regions of the Northeast, tribal areas of Madhya Pradesh, Bihar and Odisha, and the Lakshadweep and Nicobar Islands, where residents often confronted him over poor administration and everyday hardships. Rajiv, she writes, would listen patiently, sometimes asking officials not to interrupt when people complained.
Former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi feared that resigning in 1975 would split the Congress and allow the RSS to gain political ground, even as her elder son Rajiv Gandhi advised her to step down following the Allahabad High Court verdict against her, Sonia Gandhi has revealed in her memoir Belonging: A Journey of Love, released on Tuesday.
The memoir offers a candid account of the events leading to the Emergency, Sanjay Gandhi’s growing influence over his mother, the excesses of forced sterilisation and slum demolitions, and tensions within the Gandhi family involving Maneka Gandhi.
“If I resign, the party will split and scatter, and the RSS will have its way,” Indira told Rajiv, Sonia recalls in the book.
Sonia writes that Indira was convinced the RSS was using Jayaprakash Narayan’s movement to weaken the Congress. She also feared that political forces hostile to her government were determined to dismantle the party.
Indira’s distrust of the RSS, according to Sonia, went back to the freedom struggle. The memoir refers to an earlier letter in which Indira compared the organisation’s growth to that of the Brown Shirts in Nazi Germany and expressed concern about its financial backing and political ambitions.
Sonia also makes allegations concerning the RSS’s ideological history, VD Savarkar’s dealings with the British authorities and the views of some of its ideologues on Hitler. She presents these as part of Indira’s long-standing opposition to the organisation.
Recalling the political crisis of June 1975, Sonia writes that Indira was deeply troubled after the Allahabad High Court invalidated her election on June 12. Rajiv immediately went to his mother’s study, where Sonia joined them shortly afterwards.
“What should I do? “What should I do, Rajiv? Do you think I should resign?” Indira asked repeatedly, according to Sonia.
Rajiv advised her to step down, arguing that elections were only months away and a fresh mandate would settle the political uncertainty. Indira initially agreed with him.
The situation changed as opposition parties intensified their campaign. On June 22, the Supreme Court granted Indira a conditional stay. Three days later, Jayaprakash Narayan addressed a massive rally at Delhi’s Ramlila Maidan and urged government servants, the police and the armed forces not to obey orders they considered wrong.
Sonia writes that Indira regarded the appeal to the armed forces as treasonous. Senior colleagues, including Siddhartha Shankar Ray and HR Gokhale, favoured firm action, while Sanjay insisted that the opposition had to be stopped.
The Emergency was proclaimed under Article 352, and on June 26, 1975, the country woke up to arrests of opposition leaders, restrictions on protests and press censorship.
The memoir also revisits the political unrest preceding the Emergency, including the 1974 railway strike led by George Fernandes and the Nav Nirman movement in Gujarat. Sonia writes that nearly 100 people died and about 1,000 were injured during the Gujarat agitation, which was followed by the dissolution of the state Assembly.
Student protests subsequently spread to Bihar, where Jayaprakash Narayan emerged as the principal opposition figure. A substantial part of the memoir deals with Sanjay Gandhi’s political influence during the Emergency, including the consequences of his Five Point Programme.
Sonia acknowledges that Sanjay played a major role in political decision-making despite lacking constitutional authority. His programme included family planning, literacy, opposition to dowry and caste discrimination, tree planting and urban renewal.
The family planning drive, however, became associated with coercion as government officials competed to meet sterilisation targets. Sonia describes the programme as poorly conceived and implemented without sufficient regard for its consequences.
The book also details the demolition and resettlement drive around Turkman Gate in Old Delhi, where refugee families were shifted to sites beyond the Yamuna. Police firing during protests resulted in several deaths and numerous injuries.
Sonia recalls that a family elder questioned why displaced families had been moved during the monsoon when their allotted plots were flooded.
“That’s not so! You can go and see for yourself,” Sanjay responded, according to the memoir.
Indira subsequently visited the resettlement area and returned with her sari soaked in mud up to her knees, Sonia writes, exposing the difference between official assurances and conditions on the ground.
The memoir also recounts an episode involving the Kashi Vishwanath temple in Varanasi. Sonia writes that in August 1975, Pupul Jayakar informed Indira of a proposal to beautify the narrow lane leading to the temple, which was lined with centuries-old houses and shrines.
Indira immediately stopped the project after learning that it formed part of Sanjay’s urban beautification programme. Sonia alleges that the heritage Indira sought to protect was later affected by redevelopment under Prime Minister Narendra Modi in 2018.
Sanjay’s conduct also caused growing concern within the family. In July 1976, he gave an interview criticising the Soviet Union, the Communist Party of India and some of his mother’s policies, embarrassing Indira at a time when Moscow remained an important ally.
“He doesn’t listen to me,” Indira told Rajiv and Sonia. “I don’t know what to do.”
Sonia writes that Indira asked her principal secretary, PN Dhar, to undertake damage control. Sanjay’s growing political prominence was also resented by some senior Congress leaders, particularly after he was acclaimed as the undisputed Youth Congress leader at the party’s Guwahati session in November 1976.
The memoir contains unusually candid details about Maneka Gandhi and her relationship with other members of the family.
Sonia recalls initially enjoying Maneka’s company and describes her as lively and talkative. Young Priyanka often spent time listening to stories in her aunt’s room. However, relations gradually deteriorated.
Sonia writes that household staff addressed her as Bahurani and Maneka as Choti Bahu. Although she regarded the distinction as a traditional form of address, she believed Maneka saw it as a slight.
Sonia says she usually avoided responding when Maneka spoke rudely, but occasionally answered when she felt matters had gone too far. She also recalls heated exchanges between Sanjay and Maneka, including the use of expletives in Indira’s presence.
Indira was concerned about Maneka’s influence over Sanjay and believed that she was encouraging his political activities rather than restraining him.
“Uske abhi se par nikalne lage hain,” Indira remarked to Cabinet Secretary PN Dhar about Maneka, according to the memoir.
The growing tensions also affected Rajiv and Sanjay, who had previously been almost inseparable. Sonia writes that Rajiv was hurt after a mutual friend told him Maneka had suggested he was jealous of Sanjay’s political position.
Rajiv, who enjoyed his career as a pilot and preferred family life to politics, became more cautious in dealing with his brother. Nevertheless, he continued to convey complaints and warnings about the government’s conduct to Indira.
Follow PoliticsOn one occasion, Indira rebuked Rajiv for believing reports about public resentment. Rajiv insisted that although some complaints might be exaggerated, many were genuine. Sonia recalls that he left the room visibly hurt, with tears in his eyes. Indira later approached him and kissed his forehead.
The memoir also reveals Sonia’s involvement in Sanjay’s controversial Maruti car project. Sanjay had trained at Rolls-Royce in Britain but did not complete the five-year course that Indira wanted him to finish. After returning to India, he applied in December 1968 for permission to manufacture a small car and received a letter of intent towards the end of 1970.
He began working on a prototype at Gulabi Bagh in Delhi and asked Sonia to join the company’s board because she was the only family member without a government job.
The allocation of land to Maruti Ltd and the involvement of business shareholders led to allegations of favouritism. The car received a roadworthiness certificate in 1974, but legal challenges and other difficulties prevented the project from taking off.
Maruti was wound up by a court order in 1978, revived by Indira’s government in 1981 as a joint venture with Suzuki, and began production in 1983.
Sonia also recalls an uncomfortable experience during Indira’s testimony before the Allahabad High Court in March 1975. When a question concerning Sanjay’s Maruti project was raised, Sonia was asked to leave the courtroom because Indira feared she might be summoned in connection with the company.
The memoir concludes its account of the Emergency with Indira’s growing unease over the consequences of her government’s actions. By late 1976, Sonia writes, Indira had become increasingly disturbed by reports of coercion, public anger and the growing distance between the government and the people.
After Christmas that year, Indira discussed her doubts with Rajiv, who encouraged her to hold elections even if the Congress risked defeat. He specifically referred to the resentment caused by the sterilisation programme.
“Your instinct is right, Rajiv,” Indira told him, according to Sonia’s account. Sanjay opposed lifting the Emergency and warned that the Congress could lose. Cabinet Secretary PN Dhar estimated that the party might secure only 230 seats, short of a majority.
Indira nevertheless decided to proceed. On January 18, 1977, she announced the release of political prisoners and fresh elections, bringing the Emergency towards its end.
More than four decades after the 1984 anti-Sikh riots, Congress Parliamentary Party chairperson Sonia Gandhi has acknowledged that justice has been hard to come by for the victims despite four commissions, nine committees and two special investigation teams, while admitting that Congress workers were among those accused of instigating or directing the violence following Indira Gandhi’s assassination.
In her memoir, Belonging: A Journey of Love, released on Tuesday, Sonia also refers to criminal cases against RSS members, questions the failure of the administration to stop the massacre and recounts the delay in deploying the Army as mobs killed more than 2,000 Sikhs in Delhi alone.
The 544-page memoir also reveals an alleged plot to kill the entire Gandhi family during Diwali celebrations a week before Indira’s assassination on October 31, 1984, and Sonia’s desperate attempt to prevent Rajiv Gandhi from becoming Prime Minister, fearing that he would be the next target.
Revisiting one of the darkest chapters in independent India’s history, Sonia writes that several individuals, many of them Congress members, faced criminal proceedings for allegedly instigating or directing the violence. Cases were also registered against RSS members who participated in the killings, she says.
Of the hundreds of FIRs registered, four or five led to the arrest of Congress workers, according to her account.
Her account of the riots also examines the conduct of Rajiv Gandhi, who was sworn in as Prime Minister hours after his mother’s assassination.
Sonia writes that Rajiv appeared on national television on the night of October 31 and appealed for peace. He visited areas affected by violence and asked his staff to locate their Sikh colleagues and ensure their safety.
On November 1, Rajiv again went out to meet people, urging them not to seek revenge. The following day, he issued another nationwide television appeal condemning arson, looting and murder.
But Sonia also acknowledges that the machinery of government had come under severe strain, with the police unable to control violent crowds. She writes that some officials appeared to have looked the other way while others may even have encouraged the violence.
The memoir offers an account of the delay in deploying the Army, a question that has remained central to the debate over the 1984 massacre.
Sonia writes that Army chief General AS Vaidya received orders on the night of Indira’s assassination, but the family subsequently heard that he had decided against immediately mobilising nearby Army units because they were manned by Sikh soldiers.
This was against the backdrop of sporadic mutinies involving Sikh soldiers after Operation Blue Star in Gurdaspur, Ramgarh, Pune and Jammu.
Instead, Army units were ordered to move from Dehradun. According to Sonia, the troops began entering Delhi on the night of November 1 and were positioned in affected areas by noon on November 2. Curfew and shoot-at-sight orders were imposed, while civil society groups established relief camps for survivors.
Sonia also recalls that several Sikh families fleeing the violence found refuge in the Gandhi household. Some had already experienced the trauma of Partition, having fled Pakistan to rebuild their lives in India.
Yet, she admits, she was initially too overwhelmed by Indira’s murder and fears for Rajiv and her children to fully comprehend the suffering around her.
It was five years later, in riot-hit Bhagalpur in Bihar, that the enormity of the violence struck her.
In 1989, Sonia accompanied Rajiv to Bhagalpur despite warnings from their security personnel. Their aircraft landed at a small airstrip, where an angry crowd surrounded them before allowing them to proceed to a nearby hospital.
What she witnessed there left her shaken. The injured, mostly women and children, were lying on the floor because the beds were full. Women with deep wounds pleaded with her to locate their missing relatives. Children cried in terror or clung to their injured mothers.
Sonia recalls repeatedly stepping aside to regain her composure before approaching the next group of victims. She writes that the experience forced her to confront the horrors of communal violence and question whether her own grief over Indira’s assassination had overshadowed her understanding of the atrocities committed against Sikhs in Delhi in 1984.
On the flight home, she could no longer hold back her tears. The memoir also revisits attempts by successive Congress-led governments to introduce legislation against communal violence, including the 2005 and 2011 Bills.
Sonia writes that the proposed laws faced opposition mainly from the BJP and RSS, but also from Left and regional parties, which argued that existing laws were adequate and that the legislation would undermine the federal structure by interfering with the states’ responsibility for law and order.
She expresses disappointment over the failure of the legislation and alleges that communal violence, lynchings, social media and partisan governance have since combined to worsen the situation.
Beyond the political questions surrounding 1984, the memoir contains an extraordinary account of the threats facing Indira Gandhi in her final days.
Sonia reveals that the family later learnt that grenades had been hidden in a room adjoining their kitchen during Diwali celebrations on October 24, 1984, allegedly intended to kill the assembled family.
The celebrations had brought together Indira, Rajiv, Sonia, Rahul and Priyanka, along with relatives and friends. The family had lit lamps around the house and garden, following their annual tradition.
According to Sonia, the alleged plot was called off at the last moment for reasons that remained unknown. Six days later, on October 30, a car rammed into the jeep escorting Rahul and Priyanka home from school. Indira believed the collision was deliberate and regarded it as a warning.
Sonia questions the absence of adequate emergency medical arrangements despite the threats to the Prime Minister’s life. Following Operation Blue Star in June 1984, Indira had refused to replace Sikh personnel in her security detail, believing that such a decision would violate her principles.
Sonia recalls that one of the two Sikh guards who subsequently assassinated Indira had regularly played with Rahul and Priyanka. The memoir also reveals that former intelligence chief and security adviser RN Kao had warned Indira about reports that her grandchildren might be kidnapped.
The threat forced the family to withdraw Rahul and Priyanka from their boarding schools and bring them back to Delhi. Although the move disrupted their education, it allowed them to spend what became the final two months of their grandmother’s life with her.
Indira remained deeply anxious about their safety. Sonia writes that her mother-in-law appeared increasingly conscious of the danger surrounding her. She had spoken to Rahul about what should happen if she died, telling him not to cry and explaining her wishes for her funeral.
On October 25, a day after Diwali, Indira suddenly decided to visit Srinagar. Sonia was to accompany her but fell ill. Indira travelled with the children and friends, visited the Sharika Devi temple and Makhdoom Sahib shrine, and met Kashmiri Shaivite sage Lakshman Joo. The family later wondered whether Indira had sensed that it would be her last visit to Kashmir.
On October 30, at her final public rally in Bhubaneswar, Indira spoke about the possibility of death and her lifelong commitment to serving the country. She returned to Delhi exhausted and showed Sonia three handspun cotton saris she had selected in Bhubaneswar.
The following morning, October 31, Indira was preparing for a dinner in honour of Princess Anne. Sonia recalls meeting her in the dressing room, where a pale orange Bomkai sari had been laid out for the evening. They discussed the dinner menu and table decorations before Indira left for her office.
Minutes later, gunshots rang out. Sonia rushed towards the garden and saw Indira being carried into a white Ambassador car. She climbed into the vehicle and crouched beside her mother-in-law as it struggled through Delhi’s traffic without a siren. Blood covered Indira’s sari and chest. Sonia repeatedly tried to speak to her, but there was no response.
The car encountered traffic signals and further delays at the hospital entrance before Indira was taken for emergency treatment. She was declared dead at 2 pm.
Sonia returned home to collect clothes for Indira and found Rahul and Priyanka crying. Commandos had brought them home from school, and the children were desperately asking what had happened.
She selected a tribal sari and a bead necklace for her mother-in-law before returning to the hospital. Rajiv, meanwhile, had been campaigning in West Bengal when he learnt that Indira had been seriously wounded. He landed in Delhi at 3.30 pm and went straight to the hospital. There, he told Sonia that he had been asked to take over as Prime Minister.
“I have been asked . . . They want me to be sworn in as prime minister,” Rajiv told her, according to the memoir. Sonia recalls feeling as though a knife had been plunged into her heart. She could not understand why Rajiv was being asked to assume power when his mother had just been assassinated.
She pleaded with him to refuse, fearing that the same fate awaited him. “They will kill me anyway,” Rajiv replied, she writes.
Rajiv was sworn in around 6.30 pm that evening, while Indira’s body lay at the family residence. Sonia recalls that she was convinced his political journey would end in another assassination.
The memoir also offers an intimate account of Rajiv’s grief. Sonia writes that she once found him alone in his mother’s study, crying as he looked at the objects associated with her life. Despite the loss, he had to attend Cabinet meetings, receive foreign dignitaries and make arrangements for the funeral.
Sonia herself recalls entering Indira’s room and arranging her writing table, comb, hairbrush, hairpins, footwear and clothes, as though restoring order to the room could somehow preserve her presence. The book also reveals that Indira had left written instructions expressing her wish not to have a conventional funeral.
In a note dated June 11, 1984, shortly after Operation Blue Star, she had asked that her body be placed in a casket and left in a crevasse in the high Himalayas, with classical music played instead of mourning rituals.
Rajiv could not bring himself to follow those instructions. Indira was cremated on November 3. Rajiv and Sonia immersed a portion of her ashes at the Sangam in Allahabad on November 5, while Rajiv subsequently scattered ashes over the Himalayan snows.
Sonia also refers to another note in which Indira had expressed her wish for no public mourning or ceremonial memorial meetings. On November 9, Indira’s birthday, Sonia and Rajiv signed their own wills, setting out instructions for their children. Rajiv wanted their bodies to be brought to Delhi and cremated together if they died around the same time, with Rahul, their eldest child, lighting the pyre.
