Take Two

Fast unto an Assurance

Madhavankutty Pillai | 27 Jan, 2011

On the farcical evolution of the weapon that didn’t kill Mahatma Gandhi

Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M Karunanidhi performed a most intriguing fast-unto-death in 2009. Unable to bear the plight of his fellow Tamil brethren, following the LTTE’s annihilation, he lay down on the shores of Chennai’s Marina beach early morning on 27 April, after a final breakfast, awaiting his maker. His two wives were on either side of him and there were two air-coolers in the middle against his bed. After six hours, he observed the grumblings of his stomach, noticed it was 12.30 pm, and suddenly realising that he had an assurance from the Home Minister went home to have lunch. Death walked away disappointed.

Mahatma Gandhi’s enduring legacy to Indian politics is the weapon that didn’t kill him—the hunger strike. It’s a weapon now covered with a thick layer of rust with fine cartoons etched on it. Last Saturday, members of the Telengana Rashtriya Samiti went on a hunger strike and waited eagerly for Chief K Chandrasekhar Rao. They waited. And waited. Rao either forgot, or, wiser for an experience in 2009 when he had gone on a fast-unto-death of 11 days, decided that a day without food is just not worth it.

As a political weapon, fasts are pretty much useless unless you die. Andhra Pradesh’s formation is an example. In 1951, Sitaram, a Gandhian, went on a fast-unto-death, but called it off after 35 days. No promised state followed. The next year another Gandhian, Potti Sriramulu, went on a fast and died after two months. Within four days, Nehru announced statehood.

The man who set the trend was different in that he was ready to die in the sure knowledge that the world had no choice but to save him. While he pulled off phenomenal political feats by starving, Gandhi was also not averse to exploiting the idea. In 1939, he went on a fast-unto-death for democratic reforms in the small princely state of Rajkot. There was a deeper agenda. His candidate, Pattabhi Sitaramayya, was on his way to defeat in Congress party elections at the hands of Subhas Chandra Bose. To quote a Time magazine report of 13 March 1939: ‘No longer the kingpin of the Indian National Congress, the Mahatma was out to gain new prestige or martyrdom, or even to test his own power…’ The fast lasted four days, and within months, Bose was out of the party. As Gandhi once said of himself: “I am a politician trying my best to become a saint—and only too often failing in the attempt.”