| It had really all started much earlier, a slow developing drama, originating in the problems of Rayalseema and the Congress variety of the politics of protest. Even when it arrived in Delhi, in the form of protesting legislators of the Telugu Desam party, the form that it took was standards Dharnas, rallies and speech-making at the Boat Club, and requests for presenting petitions to the prime minister. Had wiser counsel prevailed, and had our prime minister met even a delegation of these legislators; then instead of exploding, it would have amounted to just another incident, almost not worthy of notice. But that was not to be, because, firstly, the prime minister wanted a 'tamasha' and, secondly, because we are captives of the politics of competitive pettiness.
The prime minister's yearnings for a 'tamasha' became patent when at a dinner earlier, Shri Janga Reddy, a BJP MP from Andhra, pleaded the cause of the agitating legislators from his home State and urged our premier to give them time. "Why?" Replied Rajiv Gandhi, in words to the effect: "Let there be a 'tamasha. ' And when Janga Reddy persisted, with the observation that Congress legislators had also demonstrated in Andhra, the prime minister quipped - even handedly, it must be granted. Well that was also a tamasha': And much later in the evening, after all the damage had been done, Shri A.B. Vajpayee recounted this in the House, the minister of state for parliamentary affairs Shri Jacob, could only say - ' Private conversations are not to be repeated in the House.' or some such words, but then the private thoughts of the prime minister had already arranged for the subsequent denouement inside the parliament.
On September 1, around 9.30 a.m., Shri Lal Krishanji Advani advised me on the telephone that Telugu Desam MLAs, Municipal Compotators and others had been tear-gassed, so could I rush to see what was actually happening. By the time I reached, police vans had already carried most of them away. On Akbar Road, where security barriers to the prime minister's house begin, there lay only one and a half pair of chappals, abandoned, and in the morning freshness of the air there lingered still that sharp tang of tear gas. Policemen in uniform idled, while those in plain clothes strutted.
It is this, with tear gas and lathis, that the issue finally reached our parliament. The lobbies were already abuzz, the question hour had not yet begun, there was excitement tinged with anxiety. Not just the Telugu Desam MPs, uniformly, most felt that a mistake had been committed, to deal thus with a delegation of elected representatives: That, surely, the police could at least have done without tear gas and lathis. Some of the reflective and concerned ruling party members were saddened by the turn events had taken. Not many had been to the site of the incident, they wanted information, in the absence of which predictable rumours began to circulate - 'There was firing also, ' some said. Smt. Renuka Chowdhury, of Telugu Desam, was particularly anxious about the fate of demonstrators; the saree of one, it was believed, had been torn into shreds, and another so overcome by tear-gas that she had fainted. And this person, said Smt. Chowdhury, 'had a history of cardiac trouble,' By tear-gas and lathi charge the issue got promoted, it was no longer an
aspect of Andhra politics, of Telugu Desam v/s the Congress(I); more important issues came to the forefront. How is public grievance to be redressed? How are elected representatives, even if they be Municipal Compotators, to be treated? How far, and in what manner, is a protest to be carried, whether inside the parliament or outside? And when outside, how ought an elected government to respond to public protests? Above all these then the issue of humility, compassion and tolerance in our elected leaders.
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