Feroze Gandhi (real name - Feroze Jahangir Ghandy) Forgotten Gandhi Who stood up against Nehru..
India’s first and undoubtedly the best investigative parliamentarian.
Feroze Gandhi must be remembered for many things— his participation in the freedom struggle which resulted in many jail terms; his painstaking research and commitment to probity in public life which cost Jawaharlal Nehru’s Finance Minister T T Krishnamachari his job; the nationalisation of life insurance; and for bringing in a law to insulate the media from defamation and libel suits when they reported the proceedings of Parliament.
Incidentally, since the Congress never takes the name of such an impassioned campaigner against corruption, the younger generation maynot know that he was Indira Gandhi’s husband, Sonia’s father-in-law and Rahul’s grandfather.
- Everyone was compelled to sit up and take notice when he spoke on the Insurance (Amendment) Bill. Feroze held the House in thrall for close to two hours as he exposed the nefarious activities of private insurance firms and built an iron-clad case for nationalisation of the life insurance business
- His arguments were so compelling that within two months the President promulgated an ordinance nationalising life insurance
Congratulating the government, Feroze said:
“To hold a horse you need a rein; to hold an elephant you need a chain.”
LIC Mundhra Scandal
when in the latter half of 1957, Feroze Gandhi got a tip off about a scam in the finance ministry. He heard that the LIC had suddenly bought shares of companies owned by H D Mundhra, an industrialist close to the Congress, at inflated prices. This prompted him to intervene during question hour and seek a special debate.
The finance minister’s disingenuous response put Feroze on full alert and he sought a special debate on this issue.
The story was that Mundhra, a businessman with a dubious record, who had funded the Congress’s election campaign ran into financial problems and wanted the Nehru government to bail him out. He asked the government to invest a crore of rupees in the shares of some of his companies.
Although none of the Mundhra companies were doing well, the government agreed to do this via the LIC. However, while the negotiations were on, Mundhra bought up shares of his own company in the Calcutta Stock Exchange and artificially jacked up the prices of his shares. Therefore, eventually, when the LIC went to the market, it bought them at prices much higher than what prevailed when Mundhra first approached the government for help.
This is what is called the LIC Mundhra Scandal.
Feroze Gandhi tracked the share prices of Mundhra Companies over a fortnight to expose the government. Finance Minister T T Krishnamachari tried to defend the deal by saying LIC decided to enter the market to build up its portfolio and so, bought these shares.
But Feroze Gandhi was not convinced. Why did you take a fancy only to Mundhra companies and why did you buy them at inflated prices? How can public money be squandered in this manner, he asked pointing out that the prices of theseshares slumped after LIC bought them. The government had no convincing answers.
Nehru was forced to institute a commission of inquiry which held TTK morally responsible for the questionable decision, leading to TTK’s resignation.
Nehru and Firoj relationship was not good
- Feroze was born in a Parsi family in Bombey. In 1912,Feroze changed the spelling of surname from Ghandy to Gandhi.
- He was imprisoned in 1930 along with Lal Bahadur Shastri in Faizabad Jail for nineteen months. He was imprisoned twice, in 1932 and 1933, while working closely with Nehru.
- He grew close to the Nehru family, especially to Indira’s mother Kamala Nehru. In 1933, Feroze proposed to Indira, but she and her mother rejected it, putting forward that she was too young, only 16.
- After Kamala’s demise in 1936, Indira and Feroze grew closer to each. They married in March 1942 according to Hindu rituals.
- Indira’s father Jawaharlal Nehru opposed her marriage and approached Mahatma Gandhi to dissuade the young couple. The couple were arrested and jailed in August 1942 during the Quit India Movement.
- In 1957, he was re-elected from Rae Bareli. He aggressively raised the Haridas Mundhra scandal involving the government controlled LIC insurance company. This was a huge embarrassment to the image of Jawaharlal.
He continued challenging the government on a number of other issues, and emerged as a parliamentarian well-respected on both sides of the bench.
Feroze died in 1960 at the Willingdon Hospital, Delhi, after suffering heart attack.