Ronald Reagan had Alzheimer’s disease going into his second term. Can you imagine the world’s most powerful man with finger on thousands of nuclear weapons, unable to remember small things? His staff carefully kept this hidden and managed the entire administration. Did they do to protect their own turf or to protect Reagan’s legacy or honor / pride? If we had known about the extent of Jinnah’s TB who knows what would be the shape of the subcontinent? Nehru kept his afflictions secret. Of course all kinds of unpleasant reasons have been ascribed to that. His daughter also suffered from TB and that was kept from the Indian people. These people have a right to privacy. No doubts about that. But they are not private citizens. Their responsibility goes beyond their families. Things they do or decisions they make have bearing on all the lives of the citizens of the country. Yes, it may be their legacy or honor but it is our lives. If our leaders have a sickness or an addiction or a character flaw that may impair their ability to make timely and correct decisions then we have a right to know.
There are many leaders in the world who deal with their afflictions out in the open. New York city mayor Rudy Giuliani and more recently Hugo Chavez of Venezuela dealt with their cancers with their constituents. It did not lead to anarchy or loss of respect for these men. VP of the US, Dick Cheney (not a very loved man) had a heart condition and everyone knew about it. It did not decrease his influence.
Of course in India, everything is a matter of either legacy or “izzat” i.e. honor. People talked about Atalji’s love for booze in hushed tones. Why? If he had a drinking problem then we had a right to know because that may have affected our decision to elect him. On the other hand if he had a drink or so in the evening then who cares! Then we have the secrets of the Gandhi family. Those are better concealed than secrets which are important to our national security. If Nehru was in love with Edwina Mountbatten, then that may have affected his judgment when it came to dealing with the British at that time. If the Indian public had known about it then they may not have re-elected him. These are important pieces of information which have long reaching implications. Think about it. If Nehru were not the PM in early 1960’s we may not have recognized the illegal Chinese rule in Tibet or given up our seat in the UNSC in favor of China. Our lives would be safer right now. Yes, we have the bloody right to know.
Sonia Gandhi is the PM. Do not kid yourself about the man in the seat. She has all the power. She is privy to all our national secrets even though on paper she is just and MP. She talks to the foreign visitors and her opinion shapes their attitudes towards us. Yes, we have a right to know everything about her – her education (because that gives us a window into her intellectual ability), her allegiances to her country of birth (Indian foreign policy could get influenced by that), her associations with foreigners (Ottavio Quattrocci) or her health. If she goes abroad to get treatment for Cancer (doesn’t India have doctors who could take care of her. We have heart surgeons who have done open heart surgeries on infants) then we need to know about it. Her loyalists would have you believe that all was wrong with India because she was not here to guide them. We need to know what kind of cancer because if her influence is so crucial then we need to know how long she is going to live. If they are trying to keep it a secret because it is breast cancer then that is ridiculous. All our families have mothers and aunts who have suffered from this terrible disease. No one is going to snicker at that. However, if her affliction is due to her lifestyle then we have a right to know.
Sonia Gandhi is someone’s mother and daughter. We all wish her full recovery. But her sickness has bearing on all our lives. We did not opt for that. She put herself in that position. It is therefore her responsibility to come clean. If she wants her health to be treated with the privacy then she should become a private citizen. Otherwise, I would like to remind her that it may be her legacy, honor or dignity but for us, it is the matter of our lives and future of our country.
The Long View: Current Events Through the Lens of History
By SAMANTH SUBRAMANIAN
In this, Sonia Gandhi appeared to be following in an established tradition, by which Indian political leaders guard news of their health as if it were a state secret. Not for them the publicly fought battles of Rudy Giuliani against his prostate cancer, of Dick Cheney against his troublesome heart, or of Hugo Chavez against his recent pelvic abscess. Even the example of Mahatma Gandhi — who let it all hang out, often greeting his ashram’s residents with updates about his bowel movements — is an aberration in Indian politics.
http://india.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/09/12/the-long-view-current-events-though-the-lens-of-history/?hp
Sonia diagnosed with cervical cancer
Congress president Sonia Gandhi is understood to have undergone a surgery for cervical cancer at Memorial Sloan—Kettering Cancer Center (MSKCC) private hospital—in New York on
Thursday.
http://www.deccanherald.com/content/181508/sonia-diagnosed-cervical-cancer.html
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