Iron Lady of Nation: Indira Gandhi was a central member of the Indian National Congress who was chosen to be the third Prime Minister of India. She was appointed as PM in the year 1966-1977 and again in January 1980 till her assassination.
From the beginning of her life, Indira Gandhi started assisting her father Jawaharlal Nehru (the first Prime Minister) in various meetings and conferences to gain political knowledge from her father and to acquire the qualities that would make the history of India.
She was selected as the President of the Indian National Congress in 1959 and after the death of her father, Indira was selected as a member of the Rajya Sabha.
In 1999, the BBC declared Indira Gandhi the "Woman of the Millennium" and in 2020 Gandhi was named among the 100 most powerful women of the century by Time magazine.
Indira Gandhi was born in November 1917 in Allahabad to a Kashmiri Pandit family. Her father Jawaharlal Nehru was one of the famous revolutionaries of that time who was fighting to free the country from the Britishers, later he became the first Prime Minister of India.
Indira was the only child in her family and spent a lonely childhood as her father mostly remained out of the city. Initially, she lived with her mother, but after some time her mother also passed away after being bedridden due to tuberculosis.
Talking about Indira Gandhi's schooling, she was mostly taught at her home and she changed tens of schools in her life span.
She did her primary education at Modern School, Dehli and International School of Geneva and completed her graduation from the University of Oxford.
During her time at university, she got plagued with ill health and had to make repeated trips to Switzerland to recover.
At this time, Germany rapidly took over Europe, and Indira's studies became next to impossible. In that circumstances she decided to return to India, leaving her studies incomplete. Later Oxford University provided her with an Honorary certificate.
In 2010, Oxford honoured her further by selecting her as one of the ten Oxasians, illustrious Asian graduates from the University of Oxford.
During an interview with Rabindranath Tagore, the name Priyadarshini was given to Gandhi because of her way of "looking at everything with kindness".
When Indira Gandhi was in Britain, she was frequently meeting with her future husband Feroze Gandhi, who hailed from Allahabad and was studying at the London School of Economics.
Their marriage took place in Allahabad according to Adi Dharm rituals even after Feroze belonged to a Zoroastrian Parsi family in Gujrat.
The couple had 2 sons Rajiv Gandhi and Sanjay Gandhi who were born around 1946.
After her marriage, Mrs. Indira Gandhi unofficially served as Personal Assistant to her father Jawaharlal Nehru during his tenure as the Prime Minister of India.
After this, she was appointed as the President of INA in 1959 and as a member of the Rajya Sabha in 1964 followed by her father's death.
At the initial, Indira Gandhi was considered a puppet to the Indian National Congress by the people of India which was crushed by her bold personality. That includes going to war with Pakistan to assist Bangladesh in the 1971 Liberation war.
In her first year as Prime Minister, she was criticized and get known as "Gungi Gudiya" by the opposition and people.
After the first general elections in 1967, Indira Gandhi started with a rocky terrain as the Raebareli constituency was provided to her, which had a serious issue with food prices.
She started by resolving this problem by devaluing the rupee and collapsing the Indian business and consumers.
After 1971, Indira Gandhi gave her political manifesto as "Garibi Hatao" in response to the opposition's manifesto "Indira Hatao" along with some great initiatives to do so.
The greatest achievement of Indira Gandhi was also seen in this time period as the victory of the first Indo-Pak War in December 1971 which led to the formation of independent Bangladesh.
After this, some of the biggest personalities in political society hailed her as Durga.
On 25th June 1975, Indira Gandhi requested Fakhruddin Ali Ahmed (President of India) to initiate an emergency to maintain the lawlessness and disorder in the country following the Allahabad High Court decision.
Accordingly, Ahmed declared a state of emergency under the provision of Article 352 (1) of the Indian Constitution.
In the year 1977, a coalition government came to power in the northern Indian state of Punjab. Gandhi for the sake of Sikh support helped orthodox religious leader Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale to gain prominence in Punjab politics.
Later Bhindranwale's organization, Damdami Taksal, was found enrolled in violent activities with other sects called the Sant Nirankari Mission and the leader was accused of instigating the murder of Jagat Narain (owner of Punjab Kesari newspaper).
After being arrested over this matter, Bhindranwale disassociated himself from the Congress Party and joined Akali Dal.
Meanwhile, a small group of Sikhs including some followers of Bhindranwale started militant activities after being targeted by the government and police for supporting the Anandpur resolution.
In 1982, Bhindranwale and approximately 200 armed followers moved into a guest house called the Guru Nanak Niwas near the Golden Temple.
By the end of 1983, the guest house turned into a militant fort and a newspaper also printed about the militant activities near the guest house.
On 23rd April 1983, the Punjab Police Deputy Inspector General A. S. Atwal was shot dead as he left the temple compound. Harchand Singh Longowal (then president of Shiromani Akali Dal) confirmed the involvement of Bhindranwale in the murder.
After many negotiations in 1984, the Prime Minister ordered the army to remove Bhindranwale and his supporters from the village complex.
Heavy combat army troops were moved toward the temple premise including tanks and heavy machine guns.
This operation was called Operation Blue Star. The operation badly destroyed parts of the temple complex including the Sikh library and the Akal Takht Shrine.
Many innocent pilgrims and Sikh fighters were also killed in this event and great destruction took place in a democratic country that recently recovered from a reign of terror.
On 31 October 1984, Indira's own bodyguards shot bullets into her body. Her two Sikhs bodyguards named Satwant Singh and Beant Singh shot her with their service weapons in the corridor when the PM was going for an interview with Peter Ustinov, who was filming a documentary for Irish television.
Beant singh shot three times while Satwant Singh shot thirty rounds into her body and surrendered themselves to the other guards.
Afterwards, both the guards were taken inside a room where Beant Singh was shot dead. Kehar Singh, another accused was arrested in the conspiracy of the murder of the PM.
During this time, Indira Gandhi was taken to the All India Medical Institute of Science for examination, and at 2:20 Tirath Das Dogra (Head of the doctors) reported Indira's death.
The forensic and Ballistic reports conveyed that the killing was done with a 38 special riffle and a Sten Submachine gun firing a total of 30 shots into her body, out of which 23 pierced through her body while 7 remained inside and this was how the very first and only female Prime Minister till date was assassinated and the reason was declared as the decisions she made regarding the Golden Temple.
Both Satwant Singh and Kehar Singh were hanged to death after this and a new era with new personalities started to grow with a pang of sadness in the depth for the death of the Iron Lady of the Nation.
