Nehru: A Contemporary's Estimate: Difference between revisions

Ramachandra Guha, who calls the book "the best single-volume study" of Nehru, with "arguments and conclusions [that] speak directly to the present",<ref name="Guha2008">Guha, Ramachandra (2008). {{cite web|title=Still relevant|url=http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-features/tp-sundaymagazine/still-relevant/article1437799.ece|work = [[The Hindu]]|date= 16 November 2008|accessdate=7 July 2015}}</ref> wrote in 2006 that  in his opinion the following excerpts taken from Crocker's book provide for the best summing up of Nehru as an individual and as a leader:{{Quote|His first concern was to see that India did not fall apart. To this end he encouraged a nationalism that would make Indians feel that they were Indians instead of feeling that they were Tamils or Punjabis or Dogras or Assamese or Brahmans or Kshatriyas or this or that caste, as they are apt. He gave special consideration to the Muslims as to induce them to feel Indian. For the same reason Christians and other minorities could always be sure of Nehru's unflinching protection. The "Secular State", that is to say a non-Hindu and all-Indian State, was fundamental to this concern.The great bulk of the people of India sensed, and they never lost the sense, that Nehru only wanted to help them and wanted nothing for himself; and that he was a ruler who had pity and kindness....Nehru had conflicts with other [Indian] leaders, such as Rajagopalachari, Rajendra Prasad and Patel, over Socialism; with Subas Chandra Bose over the Fascist approach; and with Jinnah over the status of the Muslims. Nehru's contests were always over ideas, never over any personal interests of his own, although he waged them without quarter and provoked a good deal of personal enmity. Nehru might have been ignorant or misguided about some matters, and about some persons, but he was always disinterested, always concerned with what he thought would help Indians or mankind. We can be certain that there will be no revelations to make about him of the kind which are often made about celebrities; not even revelations like those of Churchill's disagreeableness. Nehru's private face differed scarcely at all from his public face.<ref name=Guha2006>Guha, Ramachandra (2006). {{cite web|title=An uncommon diplomacy|url=https://www.themonthly.com.au/issue/2006/november/1229991194/ramachandra-guha/uncommon-diplomacy|work = The Monthly|accessdate=9 July 2015}}</ref>}}