be suspended, and Nehru and his companions were bundled out of the state. The British thought they had triumphed; Jawaharlal saw it differently, and his experience of cooperation with the Akalis led the Congress to assign him party responsibility for Punjab affairs.
At this time Jawaharlal was exercising another function, one which afforded him a great deal of satisfaction. Despite the split with the Swarajists over the Viceroyâs Council, the Congress did decide to contest local elections for municipal bodies, and in April 1923 Jawaharlal found himself elected chairman of the Allahabad Municipal Board. This was a position he did not seek but won because he was the Congressman most acceptable to the cityâs Muslim councilors, who had rejected the partyâs official nominee, the traditionalist Congress leader P. D. Tandon. Unprepared for office, Jawaharlal at first grumbled that it would distract him from the national cause, but he soon took to the job and performed creditably, earning a reputation for hard work, incorruptibility, a stubborn management style (with a low threshold of tolerance for inefficiency), and a refusal to play the patronage game. He cut through much of the self-serving cant that surrounded officialdom, refusing to declare a holiday on the anniversary of the Amritsar Massacre because he believed the staff was more interested in a holiday than in mourning the tragedy, and overruling a petty bureaucrat who had denied a prostitute permission to buy a house. (âProstitutes,â he pointed out, âare only one party to the transactionâ; if they were obliged to live only in a remote corner of the city, âI would think it equally reasonable to reserve another part of Allahabad for the men who exploit women and because of whom prostitution flourishes.â)
But his de facto mayoralty was not only about good civil administration; he unabashedly promoted his nationalist agenda, making Muhammad Iqbalâs song âSare Jahan se Achha Hindustan hamaraâ (âBetter than all the world is our Indiaâ) a part of the school curriculum, declaring Tilakâs death anniversary and the date of Gandhiâs sentencing to be public holidays (in lieu of âEmpire Dayâ), and refusing to meet the visiting viceroy, Lord Reading. He even introduced spinning and weaving into the school system. At the same time he had no patience for sectarian causes; he opposed a Hindu memberâs proposal to ban cow-slaughter, and won the Boardâs unanimous support. Though Jawaharlal gave up the chairmanship of the municipality after two years in order to devote his energies to national affairs, he missed the job and sought it again in 1928, only to lose that election by a single vote to the pro-Raj âloyalistâ candidate.
Political pressures during this period were augmented by personal stress. In November 1924, Kamala gave birth prematurely; her infant son did not survive. Shortly thereafter, her increasingly fragile health took a turn for the worse, and doctors began to suspect tuberculosis. Jawaharlal, repeatedly bedridden with fever, himself underwent a surgical operation in March 1925 for an undisclosed minor ailment. It became clear that he would soon have to take Kamala to Europe for treatment, but he had no money for such an expensive undertaking. Once again Motilal came to the rescue, arranging a legal brief for him with the princely retainer of ten thousand rupees (a sum that Jawaharlalâs modest professional experience could not possibly have justified, but which ensured that Motilal himself would keep an eye on the case). It was time, in any case, for a break from the practice of politics; the national movement was not going anywhere, and âas for our politics and public life,â Jawaharlal wrote to a friend in November 1925, âI am sick and weary of them.â On March 1, 1926, Jawaharlal, Kamala, and the eight-yearold Indira sailed for Europe.
The
At this time Jawaharlal was exercising another function, one which afforded him a great deal of satisfaction. Despite the split with the Swarajists over the Viceroyâs Council, the Congress did decide to contest local elections for municipal bodies, and in April 1923 Jawaharlal found himself elected chairman of the Allahabad Municipal Board. This was a position he did not seek but won because he was the Congressman most acceptable to the cityâs Muslim councilors, who had rejected the partyâs official nominee, the traditionalist Congress leader P. D. Tandon. Unprepared for office, Jawaharlal at first grumbled that it would distract him from the national cause, but he soon took to the job and performed creditably, earning a reputation for hard work, incorruptibility, a stubborn management style (with a low threshold of tolerance for inefficiency), and a refusal to play the patronage game. He cut through much of the self-serving cant that surrounded officialdom, refusing to declare a holiday on the anniversary of the Amritsar Massacre because he believed the staff was more interested in a holiday than in mourning the tragedy, and overruling a petty bureaucrat who had denied a prostitute permission to buy a house. (âProstitutes,â he pointed out, âare only one party to the transactionâ; if they were obliged to live only in a remote corner of the city, âI would think it equally reasonable to reserve another part of Allahabad for the men who exploit women and because of whom prostitution flourishes.â)
But his de facto mayoralty was not only about good civil administration; he unabashedly promoted his nationalist agenda, making Muhammad Iqbalâs song âSare Jahan se Achha Hindustan hamaraâ (âBetter than all the world is our Indiaâ) a part of the school curriculum, declaring Tilakâs death anniversary and the date of Gandhiâs sentencing to be public holidays (in lieu of âEmpire Dayâ), and refusing to meet the visiting viceroy, Lord Reading. He even introduced spinning and weaving into the school system. At the same time he had no patience for sectarian causes; he opposed a Hindu memberâs proposal to ban cow-slaughter, and won the Boardâs unanimous support. Though Jawaharlal gave up the chairmanship of the municipality after two years in order to devote his energies to national affairs, he missed the job and sought it again in 1928, only to lose that election by a single vote to the pro-Raj âloyalistâ candidate.
Political pressures during this period were augmented by personal stress. In November 1924, Kamala gave birth prematurely; her infant son did not survive. Shortly thereafter, her increasingly fragile health took a turn for the worse, and doctors began to suspect tuberculosis. Jawaharlal, repeatedly bedridden with fever, himself underwent a surgical operation in March 1925 for an undisclosed minor ailment. It became clear that he would soon have to take Kamala to Europe for treatment, but he had no money for such an expensive undertaking. Once again Motilal came to the rescue, arranging a legal brief for him with the princely retainer of ten thousand rupees (a sum that Jawaharlalâs modest professional experience could not possibly have justified, but which ensured that Motilal himself would keep an eye on the case). It was time, in any case, for a break from the practice of politics; the national movement was not going anywhere, and âas for our politics and public life,â Jawaharlal wrote to a friend in November 1925, âI am sick and weary of them.â On March 1, 1926, Jawaharlal, Kamala, and the eight-yearold Indira sailed for Europe.
The
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