There can be no doubt at all about Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s agony over the avoidable death of a critically ill patient unable to enter Chandigarh’s Post-Graduate Institute of Medical Research because of the utter insensitivity and incompetence of the PM’s security detail. On the other hand, there can be no two opinions on the imperative of protecting the prime minister and other leaders most diligently and effectively. It should not be necessary to say this after what happened to Indira Gandhi in 1984 and Rajiv Gandhi seven years later.

The key question, however, is why cannot this essential task

be undertaken efficiently yet humanely? Only in the world’s largest democracy does the security establishment treat the people as dumb, driven cattle and get away with it. What drives me to despair is that the more the government talks about reforming and streamlining the security set-up, the worse it becomes. It is the nature of the beast. As the Urdu poet said: “Marz barhta gaya, joon joon dwa ki (the more the medication, the worse became the ailment)”.

During the recent talkathon on Indira Gandhi’s life, times and legacy, Arun Nehru made the startling revelation that on October 31, 1984, when he and some other members of the family mournfully returned from the AIIMS to the prime minister’s house there was total confusion: not a single securityperson could be found on the premises. (Whether anybody took any action against the absentees no one knows.) It can perhaps be argued that circumstances on that egregiously black day had unhinged almost everyone. But did things improve even two years later?

... contd.