Catherine Clement, French philosopher, feminist and the author of Edwina and Nehru, says Congress president Sonia Gandhi was not “shocked at all” with Clement’s novel in 1993 and can’t understand why her government didn’t back Universal Studios’ film based on the same relationship— between India’s first prime minister and the wife of Lord Mountbatten, the country’s last viceroy.

The Edwina-Nehru affair had become the subject of renewed interest in India when Universal Studios announced a film based on British historian Alex Von Tunzelmann’s book, The Indian Summer. But last month, the proposed film had to be shelved, ostensibly due to spiralling costs but the real reason, reports alleged, was that the Congress government was uncomfortable projecting any image of Nehru other than that of a statesman and wanted changes in the script. The government, though, denied any censorship.

“I haven’t read the book but I don’t understand why the government won’t allow the movie to be shot. Why should they object to the truth?” Clement, 71, told Indian journalists in Paris last week.

Clement first visited India in 1983 to prepare for the Year of India in France in 1985 and later with her husband Andre Lewin, who was French Ambassador to India between September 1987 and February 1991. Even after the couple left for Vienna, where Lewin was posted after his India assignment, Clement visited India frequently as part of her work with the Rajiv Gandhi Foundation. “I met Sonia Gandhi several times and when my book was out, gave her a copy of it. The next time I saw her, she said the book was fine. The Edwina-Nehru relationship was never a secret. It’s a magnificent love story. This is not a sex scandal,” she said.

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