Indira Gandhi, Prime Minister of India for over sixteen years, was a brave freedom fighter and a passionate patriot, deeply committed to the honour and integrity of India. She was also a devoted mother and grandmother, who was great fun to be with-she loved books, nature, art, sports and puzzles.
Born into the illustrious Nehru family in Allahabad, Indira Priyadarshini Gandhi was educated at Santiniketan, Geneva and Oxford, and was determined since childhood to serve the people of India. This biography, with a foreword by Rajiv Gandhi, and illustrated with rare photographs, portrays very simply but eloquently the life of the 'Iron Lady of India' from her birth on 19 November 1917 to her assassination on 31 October 1984.
H.Y. Sharada Prasad was media advisor to both Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi, serving in the Prime Minister's Office from 1966-1978, and then again from 1980-1988.
Educated at Mysore University and jailed during the Quit India Movement, he began his professional life as a journalist. His other works include Rashtrapati Bhavan: The Story of the President's House and Exploring Karnataka, besides a large number of translations and anthologies. He also edited the Selected Works of Jawaharlal Nehru. H.Y. Sharada Prasad was honoured with the Padma Bhushan in 2000 and the Indira Gandhi Award for National Integration in 2001. He passed away in 2008.
Everyone spends the early years with a very special person-one's mother. My own mother was unusual. She later became Prime Minister of India and famous all over the world, as this book will tell you. Even when I and my younger brother were small, she did a great amount of work for the country. But she spent a good deal of time with us, and took care to make it exciting. She never put on airs of being important or busy. She was full of games and puzzles and stories and bits of poetry. She knew a great deal about history, about books, about art and about trees and birds. She made us feel we were her equal. She refrained from lecturing or giving advice and encouraged us to discuss matters with her. She let us take our own decisions. Later, when I grew up, I regarded her as a friend rather than as someone twenty-six years older.
One of her favourite statements was that a person who was interested became interesting.
She remained a great learner always trying to understand new ideas and re-examine the old.
The world fascinated her. She believed in being mentally and physically alert all the time. That is how she was able to do the work of a dozen people.
I hope this book will help you to understand how Indira Gandhi was spurred from her childhood by the ideal of freedom and a determination to serve the people of India and the whole world.
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