The comeback
was tumultuous. It was almost as if a goddess, wronged
and reviled during the Emergency and after, had returned
to take revenge, riding on the indecisions of a bunch of
bickering old men, and a decision of a landslide victory
in 1980. But Indira without power plays was like India
without the Nehru dynasty. Her policy in Punjab went
disastrously wrong, and Operation Bluestar broke the
state's faith in the nation. Indira paid the price in
1984, riddled with assassins' bullets. It was the end of
an era. The end of the old India.
The comeback
was tumultuous. It was almost as if a goddess, wronged
and reviled during the Emergency and after, had returned
to take revenge, riding on the indecisions of a bunch of
bickering old men, and a decision of a landslide victory
in 1980. But Indira without power plays was like India
without the Nehru dynasty. Her policy in Punjab went
disastrously wrong, and Operation Bluestar broke the
state's faith in the nation. Indira paid the price in
1984, riddled with assassins' bullets. It was the end of
an era. The end of the old India.
