Poles recall Indian Maharaja with affection
It is a heart-warming story in a world riven by discord, conflict and hate. At the height of the Second World War, a group of Polish people escaped some of its fiercest battles and took a circuitous route through Central Asia via Iran and Afghanistan, arriving eventually in the Saurashtra region of Gujarat. Most Polish refugees. who had made their way to India, were housed in camps in Nagpur, Kolhapur and Bombay. The British Indian authorities, preoccupied by grave matters of moment, were in a quandary when around 1,000 traumatized 15 year-old children descended on them. Not so the ruler of the little Princely State, the Jam Saheb of Nawanagar.
Nephew and successor to the great Kumar Shri. Ranjitsinjhi – ‘Ranji’ to his friends and admirers in England – a great batsman and cricketer, chivalrous and generous to a fault, who had cast a unique light on the country’s national sport, had become and remains to this day, one of game’s foremost icons. A.G. Gardiner, a distinguished English journalist of the time described him thus: ‘the prince of a little State, but the king of a great game…It is the Jam Saheb’s service that, through his genius for the English game, he has familiarized the English people with the idea as a man of like affections with ourselves, and with capacities beyond ours…his name will live in the hearts of hundreds of thousands of British people to whom he has given happy days and happy memories.’
It was with this gift of friendship, of humanity and compassion, that ‘Ranji’s’ kin, Digvijaysinhji Ranjitsinhji Jadeja of Nawanagar, stepped up to welcome the 1,000 young Polish refugees, bewildered by their strange surroundings - separated from their parents or orphaned – at the small town of Balachedi in 1942, when Poland was under Nazi occupation. This was to be their home for the next four years, by which time the war had ended, and they made ready to to depart.
The Jam Saheb set up a boarding school for his Polish wards, saw to their culinary needs, as their palates were unused to spicy Indian cuisines, and did everything within his powers to give his teenage guests a home from home. It is a remarkable story, of which little or nothing is known across the world, but in Poland, the Jam Saheb’s kindness and hospitality have never been forgotten. A street and a school in the Polish capital Warsaw are named after him and the people at large remember him with warmth and affection
The Hindi-speaking Polish Ambassador to India Adam Burakowski is organizing the return of the once children now in their eighties or nineties to Nawanagar; trying to trace them is anything but easy. Some of the inmates have made the return journey to Nawanagar; a couple who first met there were to get married later; the Maharaja made this possible, they said.
Ambassador Burakowski and Anu Radha, the producer of the film documentary of the remarkable experience, hope to bring the living members of this dwindling Polish community back to India by the end of 2018 for the centenary commemoration of Poland’s Independence. Mr Buraskowski was educated at the school in Warsaw bearing the name of Maharaja. He made his first exploratory trip to India in 1997 by the same land route as his compatriots, and has been drawn to the country and its culture ever since. The Polish Institute in Delhi is a bridge of mutual understanding. Long may the friendship between the peoples of India and Poland endure as a light unto the nations.
Reaffirming India’s ties with Iran
International diplomacy is no zero sum game; nor should it be. India has its national interests like those of other nations. Iran has recently been the target of virulent attack by the Trump administration and its proxies in the Arab world, most notably Saudi Arabia. Iran’s alleged tyranny is loudly declaimed, even as Saudi ‘moderation’ is robustly acclaimed, its intervention in Yemen studiously ignored, despite the pestilence and famine, caused by Saudi weaponry.
Whatever the domestic policies of the Iranian government, the country’s foreign policy is guided by the need to protect its sovereignty and independence, both undermined in 1953 by the CIA engineered coup that overthrew the democratic regime of Mohammed Mossadegh followed by the installation of the pliant Shah. The United States has never forgiven Iran for the 1979 Revolution that displaced the Shah and expelled America. Iran is a dominant power in the Greater Middle East and a power to be reckoned with.
Such is the backcloth to the current India-Iran relationship. President Hassan Rouhani’s visit to India was a spectacular success, built on the convergence of their deep rooted national interests. Prime Minister Narendra Modi drew attention to energy, trade, banking, connectivity and anti-terror cooperation as the bedrock of the relationship going forward.
President Rouhani’s words were a ringing declaration of affirmation and intent. ‘On important bilateral and international issues, we have no divergence. Today, we discussed our agreements and the future course of action on Chabahar and India’s contribution to the Chabahar-Zahedan railways.’ Both sides were in full accord on making transit and trade the core of their relationship, emphasizing the role of Chabahar as the door to landlocked Afghanistan. Around the port, India would invest in in the construction of fertilizer plants, petrochemicals and metallurgy. For his part, Mr Modi described Chabahar as the ‘golden gateway to Afghanistan and the Central Asian region.’
The allusion to Central Asia is key to the long game and great game rolled into a single concept of strategic endeavour. Iran will be the hub of India’s economic outreach to Central Asia and beyond into the Russian Federation and Belarus via Armenia, Astrakhan etc – an affirmation of intent to be an active member of the Eurasian North-South customs union sponsored by Moscow. Addressing the Observer Research Foundation (a Delhi-based think-tank), President Rouhani dwelt on his country’s fraught ties with America. ‘Our destiny was in the hands of the US for a long period of time. The US made a promise to us and they have broken it. If it violates this agreement (on the nuclear deal) it will regret it.’ Regional developments not in tune with Western requirements are ignored by the Western media. Playing ostrich reflects prejudice, rather than pride.
British companies caution PM on immigration
British companies, faced with a recruitment crisis, with labour shortages hitting critical levels in certain sectors, have called for clarity on post-Brixit immigration policy. Adam Marshall, Director-General of the British Chambers of Commerce (BCC) has revealed that the lack of candidates for some jobs was biting hard, hence he warned ministers against bringing forward a ‘draconian and damaging’ visa or work permit system. BCC surveys have showed that nearly three-quarters of firms attempting to recruit were experiencing difficulties ‘at or near the highest levels,’ since BCC records were kept twenty-five years ago. ‘The simple fact is that many businesses cannot afford to wait much longer for a clear UK immigration policy to emerge,’ said Mr Marshall, pointing to further delays to the government’s immigration white paper.
Decades ago, Dean Acheson, the US Secretary of State, with acerbic wit, remarked: ‘Britain has lost an empire and not found a role.’ How right he was. Years debating entry into the then European Common Market, followed by a slow build up of steam against Helmut Kohl’s Germany in the Thatcher years, the Commonwealth relegated to the attic, unswerving loyalty to the ‘special relationship’ with the United States in an overblown, fictional crusade for human rights and democratic values, subscribing to every misbegotten falsehood emanating from Washington, whether it be on Saddam Hussain’s non-existent ‘weapons of mass destruction,’ or 40 years before that, Lyndon Johnson’s manufactured Gulf of Tonking ‘incident,’ which was the President’s excuse to launch America’s fullscale, ill-fated invasion of Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia.
It is against this dismal narrative that the present confusion and shilly-shallying on Brexit and much else, including Britain’s future relationship with European Union must be placed. The fundamental issue in the continuing miasma is Britain’s role in the world. The kaleidoscope of images, from the Russian threat here, there and everywhere is vintage late Victorian music hall or later pantomime. But the show goes on regardless. Is Alice lost in blunderland?
