Shashi Tharoor - The Great Indian Novel

‘Er. . I wouldn’t take it so personally, sir,’ Heaslop began.

‘Shut up, Heaslop, will you, there’s a good fellow,’ came the reply from the Resident, whose round red cheeks gave him the appearance of a superannuated cherub, albeit one whose wings have been trod upon by a careless Jehovah. ‘When I want your opinion I’ll ask for it.’

The equerry subsided into a sulky silence.

‘He has humiliated me,’ his superior went on. ‘And he has made matters worse by drawing attention to his former position here, which means I shall be unwelcome in every planters’ club from here to Bettiah.’ He glowered pinkly at the enormity of the privation. ‘Never in the entire history of my family in India has such a thing happened to any of us. Not even to my brother David, who spends his time drawing pictures of animals.’

He stopped in front of the young man, who was drinking deeply from a tall glass. ‘I must do something about this rabble-rouser,’ he muttered. ‘Presuming to usurp the legitimate functions of the district administration! Standing half- naked before a representative of His Majesty and inviting him, daring him, to pronounce sentence on his open defiance of the law! Serving on so-called “inquiry committees” and depriving honest planters of their livelihood! There has to be an end to this nonsense.’

Heaslop opened his mouth in habitual response, then thought better of it.

‘Things are bad enough already,’ Sir Richard went on. ‘We have native lawyers declaiming against our rule in every legislative forum, even when they have been nominated to their seats for the most part as presumed Empire loyalists. We have had a nasty little boycott of British goods, with fine Lancashire cotton being thrown on to bonfires. We have even had bombs being flung by that Bengali terrorist, Aurobindo, and his ilk. But all these were, in the end, limited actions of limited impact. Ganga Datta shows every sign of being different.’

‘In what way, sir?’ Despite himself, Heaslop was intrigued.

‘The man challenges the very rules of the game,’ the Resident barked. ‘Paradoxically, by using them for his own purposes. He knows the law well, and invites, even seeks, its sanction by deliberately — deliberately, mind you — violating it in the name of a higher truth. Twaddle, of course. But dangerous twaddle, Heaslop. He appeals to ordinary people in a way the chaps in the pin-stripe suits in the Viceroy’s Council simply can’t. In Motihari they flocked to him, irrespective of caste or religion. Untouchables, Muslims, Banias all rubbing shoulders in his campaign, Heaslop! And he stands before them in his bed-sheet, revelling in their adulation.’

Heaslop remained studiously mute. ‘You know what the fellow dared to say when the President of the Planters’ Club commented on the inappropriateness of his attire?’ Sir Richard rummaged in his pockets and pulled out a newspaper clipping. ‘”Mine is a dress,’” he quoted in mounting indignation, ‘”which is best suited to the Indian climate and which, for its simplicity, art and cheapness, is not to be beaten on the face of the earth. Above all, it meets hygienic requirements far better than European attire. Had it not been for a false pride and equally false notions of prestige, Englishmen here would long ago have adopted the Indian costume.” I ask you! Your precious Mr Ganga Datta would have the Viceroy in a loincloth, Heaslop. What on earth is that sound you are making?’

For Heaslop, overcome by the image of Lord Chelmsford’s sturdy calves bared in Delhi’s Durbar Hall, was spluttering helplessly into his glass.

‘Drastic measures are called for, Heaslop,’ Sir Richard continued, unamused. ‘I’m convinced of that. This fellow must be taught a lesson.’

‘How, sir?’ Heaslop asked, in spite of himself.

The Resident looked at him sharply. ‘That’s precisely what I’m trying to give some thought to, Heaslop.’ He lowered his tone. ‘We’ve capitulated too often already. Think of that terrible mistake over the partition of Bengal. We carve up the state for our administrative convenience, these so-called nationalists yell and scream blue murder, and what do we do? We give in, and erase the lines we’ve drawn as if that were all there was to it. That could be fatal, Heaslop, fatal. Once you start taking orders back you stop being able to issue them. Mark my words.’ He stopped pacing, and turned directly to his aide. ‘What action can we take? It must be something I can do, or recommend to the States Department, something in keeping with the gravity of his conduct. If he were still Regent I’d have his hide for a carpet. But I suppose it’s too late for that now.’

‘Yes, sir,’ Heaslop agreed reflectively. ‘Unless. .’

‘Yes?’ Sir Richard pounced eagerly.

‘Unless it isn’t really too late,’ Heaslop said slowly. ‘I have an idea that, if it’s a question of our competence to act against him, we might be able to, er, catch him on a technicality.’

‘Go on,’ the Resident breathed.

‘You see, when Ganga Datta handed over the reign, I mean the reins, of Hastinapur to the princes Dhritarashtra and Pandu and retired to his ashram, he was obliged under the law to notify us formally that he had ceased to be Regent,’ Heaslop explained carefully. ‘But he was probably so busy organizing the marriages of his young charges as soon as they’d come of age, that he quite simply forgot.’

‘Forgot?’

‘Well, it happens, sir. In the ordinary course we’d hardly pay much attention to it. Many of the princely states are less than conscientious about observing the fine print of their relations with us. Indians simply haven’t developed, ah. . our sense of ritual.’

Sir Richard looked at him suspiciously. Heaslop did not blink. ‘But doesn’t the court at Hastinapur employ an Englishman as a sort of secretary, to attend to this sort of thing?’

‘Well, yes, there is Forster, sir, Maurice Forster, just down from Cambridge, I believe. But he seems to, ah, prefer tutoring young boys to performing his more routine secretarial duties. I have the impression he doesn’t take many initiatives, sir. Never quite managed to get the hang of what India’s all about. Considers it all a mystery and a muddle, or so he keeps saying. He waits to do what he is told, and I suspect that if the business of the notification didn’t occur to the Regent, it wouldn’t have occurred to poor Forster, either.’

‘Hmm.’ The Resident’s round features softened with hope. ‘And what exactly does this permit me to do, Heaslop?’

‘Well, sir.’ Heaslop sat up, choosing his words carefully. ‘If we haven’t been notified that Ganga Datta has ceased to be Regent, then technically, as far as we’re concerned, he still is. I mean, despite any other evidence to the contrary, we’re entitled to consider him to be in full exercise of the powers of Regent until we have been formally notified otherwise. Do you see, sir?’

‘Yes, yes, man, go on.’

‘Well, sir, if he’s still Regent — ’

‘He has no business going about preaching sedition outside the borders of the state.’ Sir Richard finished the sentence gleefully. ‘Conduct unbecoming of a native ruler. I like it, Heaslop, I like it.’

‘There’s only one thing, sir,’ the equerry added in a slightly less confident tone of voice.

‘Yes?’ The fear of bathos added octaves to the Resident’s timbre. ‘Don’t tell me you’ve overlooked something, Heaslop.’

‘No, sir. It’s just that what he did, sir, in Motihari, wasn’t exactly criminal, sir. The case was withdrawn. On the direct orders of the Lieutenant-Governor of the state. And then he was invited to join the official inquiry committee. It might be going too far, sir, for us to proceed against him for something Delhi doesn’t consider seditious.’