A governor with a difference

West Bengal governor Gopalkrishna Gandhi has demitted office after completing five years in office. His tenure was marked by a series of controversies, chief of which was his open criticism of the Marxists’ role in Nandigram. This was untypical of the gentleman that Gopal was.

If he did take the bold position that the ruling party was at least partially to blame for the bloodshed in the area, it must have been due to his sense of outrage. Naturally, his position on Nandigram aroused the ire of chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharya and his colleagues in government and outside in the party apparatus. But the non-partisan in the state and elsewhere knew how right Gopal was in his indignation. Bhattacharya’s subsequent admission — honest and transparent that it was — helped set the record right in favour of an outspoken governor.

Those in government thereafter went on needling him on trivial matters, as when they admonished him for announcing that, in view of the power crisis in the state, lights in Raj Bhavan would go off every evening for two hours. This was nothing more than a symbolic gesture. It was not gimmickry, but a sincere exhortation to the public to save on energy. The ruling party picked on him as if he was blaming them for the shortage of power. It was definitely a case of a pricked conscience and the unkindest cut of all to a man who was known for everything other than exhibitionism. True to his nobility, Gopal did not react at all.   

Gopal is a rare breed of public servant who does not seek office or perquisites that go with it. Assignments — secretary to governor SL Khurana and President KR Narayanan, director, Nehru Centre, London and High Commissioner to South Africa — were indeed prize jobs. These came unsought because of Gopal’s reputation for balance and integrity. He spoke little even to friends like me. But when he did, one could see seriousness of purpose and an admirable objectivity. He had the great responsibility of upholding an enviable lineage, both of the Mahatma and Rajaji, his grandfathers on either side of his parents.

That was a burden lesser mortals like us could have hardly borne without a blemish during long years of public office. Gopal has come out of the test unscathed. He could have stayed on in office. He did not, obviously out of a sense of propriety. I was expecting him to be sent to Gujarat (where there is a vacancy), and if the government did decide to send him there, that would have been the appropriate place for the Mahatma’s grandson to end his glorious career.

Gopal Gandhi’s tenure as governor raised many issues governing that high office. What kind of men and women should be sent to the Raj Bhavans? What is their role vis-à-vis the state governments? It is an open secret that right from Independence the Centre had misused the prerogative to appoint governors, by choosing persons whom either the public had rejected at the hustings or those who had become inconvenient for the powers that be in New Delhi.

Some downright bad postings of men with a dubious reputation had been made in the past. Also, the job with enormous perquisites had been given to persons who had sought it. As a result,

postings had come with a price tag. The quid pro quo has taken the form of an unjustified recommendation for President’s Rule or a sanction of prosecution against a serving chief minister or denial of such a sanction, depending on what New Delhi wanted.

In a country surcharged with crass party politics, such considerations other than merit are natural. A sober and mature governor can bring so much good to a state’s governance, especially in the form of a cleaner administration of universities, an area that reeks with nepotism and corruption. Possibly, it is too much to expect choices like Gopal Gandhi to be anything other than an aberration that comes once in a way!