The Story of Two Lals--Motilal & Jawaharlal

SOMETIME back I used to receive a pamphlet titled “SHAKTI SANDESH” published from Calcutta and now another paper from Shri R.V.Bhasin, Advocate, Supreme Court (National Publications, 76,Bajaj Bhawan, Nariman Point, Mumbai-400 021; website: www.rvb.net: ISBN-81-67405-04-X; Price Rs.5/-) carrying almost the same contents about the religion and originate of Nehrus. When I received “Shakti Sandesh” I handed over that to my then editor Shri V.P.Bhatia (now no more) for the authenticity of the facts and after reading the paper he advised me to comment on this because so many learned have been raising his issue time and again but due to some political pressure this issue is always dumped at the beginning and some M.O.Mathai-like only could stormed over in this cup of tea.
So for just memory and record, like “Shakti Sandesh” this may-be-valued paper lest lost in the sands. I am putting what this Supreme Court lawyer, Shri R.V.Bhasin writes, is as follow: --
AN NRI by the name of Mr. A. Ghosh now no more, published several important books from his US address 5720,W.Little Rock Texas Concerning India and her important men associated with his own country India. He is dead now, but one son of his has a job in CANADA. Through one intermediately, I am provided with certain papers dealing the Nehru Dynasty. Some Patriotic Indians on reading my two-page pamphlet on Mrs. Sonia Gandhi and the Nehru Gandhi Dynasty, have sent to me some further interesting and important old papers by the reading of which I am possessed of further interesting information that must be told in public interest to the people of India.
One is aware of the fact that one can change one’s religion and even one’s own name by following some simple, legal, procedure. One could recall how Phiroze Khan to Phiroze Gandhi when he married Indira Gandhi daughter of Pt.Jawaharlal Nehru and grand -daughter of Shri Motilal Nehru.
It is learnt that Indira Gandhi on marrying Phiroze Khan changed her religion from Hinduism to Islam. They are learnt to have married in one London Mosque. Indira Gandhi is further learnt to have her name to “Mainuna Begum”. This happened in 1941 when inter-religious marriages were illegal and to make them lawful one of the two spouses had to change one’s religion. The females always undergo change of their family surnames to accept the surname or the family of their husbands.
One has never heard even on one’s change of religion, the family surname of a male being changed. For, e.g., I am myself R.V.Bhasin, R and V stand for my name Raghu Vansh and Bhasin stands for my family surname Bhasin that never undergoes any change. Hence, many people in Muslims and Sikhs may also be found to have changed their names but none changes one’s surname on the change of one’s faith or religion. I know one Barkat Ali Bhasin (a Muslim) and Santokh Singh Bhasin (a Sikh). Many persons may be found on the Indian sub-continent with their changed names and religions but in all cases, no one is known to have changed their surnames or family names. It is possible that in this clan of Bhasin many of my unknown ancestors might have changed their religion for Hindu to Muslim or Sikh. I have never heard people giving up their surnames even on conversions of religion. People may altogether give up using their surnames just Sant Fateh Sigh did after he became a Sikh from a Muslim with his former name as Fateh Khan (?).
The Nehru Dynasty got popular with the father of Jawaharlal Nehru, Motilal Nehru. They are known to have their ancestors. Motilal’s father was one Gangadhar and who were his ancestors could only be traced out from the research following the surname of KAUL, it is a popular Kashmiri Brahmin caste that helps one’s ancestral pedigree.
There are known to be some professional Purohits in many Hindu Tirtha Stanhas (Holy Pilgrimage religious places). In he early days, the Brahmin Purohits recorded the family names and connections around them in specially maintained (Wahis, records of the visiting Hindu/Brahman pilgrims to such holy places) I am aware of Haridwar, Nasik and Matan in Kashmir where the Purohits called as Pandas earned their livelihoods through such family running business of recording the details of the visiting families of the (Pilgrims called the Jajmans) in these places. They came to such places for many holy purposes like immersion of the ashes of the dead from all over India. My enquiries revealed that at these places, a Hindu in India could go back to as much as 2/300 years before 1857 when India went through as unsuccessful 1st War of Independence called by the British as the Sepoy mutiny. These records were gathered only on the basis of pilgrim’s surnames or family clans. Many Pandas in these places even orally remember the families of their Jajmans and passed on this knowledge to their following generations. By contacting local Pandas of the above mentioned Tirth Sathanas or the holy places, one could succeed in tracing back one’s ancestry. Whereas one could easily obtain information on ‘Kaul Clan’, no research has succeeded tracing backwards the late ancestry of the Nehru Clan. Since we know that Jawaharlals was a Nehru family descendent of Motilal but who was before Gangadhar Kaul is not traceable. Hence some people like the above-referred Mr. A.Ghosh have doubted the reality of the Nehrus? He mentions in his papers that they were converts to Islam in Kashmir and thrust upon themselves the Hindu names adopting new surname of Nehru in order to escape the wrath of the soldiers of East India Company around 1857 or before who did not favour the Muslim employees of the Moghuls in Delhi. Many Kashmiris moved out of Kashmir very well hereto Delhi in search of jobs with the Moghul emperor of Delhi and many more also served the East India Company by declaring themselves as Hindus from Kashmir knowing mostly Persian languages. Such preference is also learnt to have been given to Persian knowing Hinds in Bengal particularly in Calcutta, Dacca and Mushidabad. The Hindus, abdicating their surnames like Kaul served no Hindu religious purpose. Mr. A.Gosh speaks in his left over papers that some Muslims in Kashmir did change their names and gave up even using their Hindu surnames in order to look for jobs within the set up of the Moghul rulers last of who was Bahadur Shah Zafar Khan. The British deported him to Rangoon where he died as prisoner. His last wish as per his famous poem ‘Do Gaz Zamin Na Bhi Mil Saki, Kue Yaar Mein’. The British Viceroy refused his dead body to be brought to Delhi and buried there. This happened almost around the year 1857.
How the surname of KAUL came to be changed definitely to Nehru (something totally different and never existing before) in case of Motilal and Jawaharlal demands further research. These are intriguing facts. The word ‘Nehru’ does have a hidden word of NEHR meaning ‘CANAL’.
It is somewhere said as another fact of history that between he present monument of Red Fort and the Mosque presently called ‘Fatehpuri’ on the other end of the present day CHANDNI CHOWK, Delhi used to have a canal instead of what we see at preset in the old Delhi a famous Road by the name of Chandni Chowk. It is further learnt that along both side of this canal, there lived special and important employees of the Mughul Emperors after there lived special and important employees of the Moghul Emperors after there lived special and important employees of the Moghul Emperors after Shah Jehan. On both sides of this canal, some people in order to hide some secrets started calling themselves as Nehrus. They lied and worked in the Red Fort and were allotted housed to live outside the Red Fort on the both sides of the canal. Some of them called themselves in course of time as Nehrus meaning living as the employees of the Moghuls. They came to consider themselves as very special since they refused to work for the East India Company.
I understand from a book by the name of Profile and persons published by our present Foreign Minister Mr. Natwar Singh that he as an OSD of the Foreign Ministry accompanied Mrs. Indira Gandhi who when the Prime Minister of India visited Afghanistan and proceeded to the grave of the 1st Moghul Emperor Babar and paid homage on that grave when Natwar Singh was also there. It is possible that Jawaharlal Nehru and Indira Gandhi had perhaps spoken to each other of their ancestors being the Moghuls. Motilal’s father Gangadhar is further believed to have taken a Hindu name and the surname of Kaul to fit into Hindu caste system for easy marriage etc.
Motilal’s first wife died and he is said to have brought another women from Kashmir to Allahabad from whose womb was born the first child who Motilal named Jawaharlal Nehru. Mr. A. Ghosh doubts if the second wife of Motilal was at all married to him or that she was brought paternity of Jawaharlal Nehru. According to him Jawaharlal Nehru’s father was either the famous lawyer of Allahabad Mubarak Ali or the Nawab of Oudh in whose house Jawaharlal grew up till he was ten yeas of age and was later sent to the Harrows (The school in England) and later to the Trinity college also in England. Jawaharlal Nehru prominently wrote “HE IS PROUD TO BE REARED UP AS AN ISLAMIST, AND AN ENGLISH MAN BY EDUCATION AND HE IS HINDU BY AN ACCIDENT’.
Mubarak Ali, the lawyer is said to have refused the so-called women or wife of Motilal to give the delivery of her first child at his house i.e., the Ishrat Manzil that was changed into Anand Bhawan when Motilal moved into that house after winning a legal case for the Rani of Etawah at the Privy Council at London. This was done both by Motilal and the famous lawyer Mubarak Ali who lost Rani of Etawah’s case both in the lower court as well as in the High Court of Allahabad By way of legal fee the Rani of Etawah is said to have given by way of legal fee to the above named two persons Rs 10 lakhs and also the estate of Amethi which she owned and was passed on to Motilal Nehru. For this reasonable Nehrus decide Amethi as their inheritance from their ancestors and decide to contest elections from there.
Mir Ganj area in Allahadad is a well-known Red Light area since long. It is not considered as any decent person’s good address. Mr. A.Ghosh referring to Motilal Nehru calls him as a brothel keeper. It is there that the Aristocrat Muslims used to visit that area for the purposes of prostitution. Motilal is further said to have offered his wife i.e. the mother of Jawaharlal Nehru to his own boss Mubarak Ali under whom Motilal worked as a Mukhtear when he was only a poor man serving persons like his boss and others. Jawaharlal Nehru is said to have grown up and reared up as an Islamist in the palace of Nawab if Oudh. His education in England could never be thought of or paid for by Motilal Nehru who acquired his riches only on being paid by the Rani of Etawah the legal fee that run in lakhs of rupees and the estate of Amethi which could not have been of any great value in those days. Its owner Mubarak Ali to Motilal or it is possible that he bought it from the owner at the price, which he could then afford, either gifted the Ishrat Manzil (Haveli in Allahabad). Rumours remain that the costs involved for the Nehru family to move to England for education and medical purposes was paid for by the Nawab of Oudh and or by Mubarak Ali, the owner and seller of the Haveli called the Ishrat Manzil. There is another ‘Haveli’ also by the similar name of Ishrat Manzil in Allahabad whose owner was one Akbar Allahabadi.
It is a fact worth taking note of that when Jawaharlal Nehru became the Prime Minister of India, he had his original house of birth in Mir Ganj, Allahabad raised Hathi Singh and Vijaylakshmi were also born there. While some early childhood pictures of these three sisters of Nehru have been seen but none of the boy Jawaharlal Nehru is found.
Mr. A. Ghosh curiously wants to examine why Jawaharlal Nehru as the Prime Minister of India saw to it that the house in which he was born located at Mir Ganj in Allahabad was destroyed?
Why, he did not do anything before he became the Prime Minister of India? Admittedly Mir Ganj is the Red Light area of Allahabad where Mubarak Ali, the employer of Motilal frequently visited for undesirable purposes. Why even on the request of Motilal, he refused to let wife of Motilal deliver her first child who was Jawaharlal himself in the Ishrat Manzil that was later remained as Anand Bhawan? Mr. Ghosh seriously doubted the paternity of Jawaharlal who according to him was a bastard child either of Mubarak Ali or of the Nawab of Oudh who frequented this house before the wife of Motilal became pregnant?
Further, it is well known that Phiroze Khan son-in-law of Jawaharlal was buried on his death in a Muslim graveyard at Allahabad. None important is said to have been present when Phiroze was buried and hence none can throw any light if even the wife of Phiroze i.e. Indira and her sons and her father were at all present on his death at the time of his burial/ Recently, some nephews of Phiroze published a letter to the press that the grave of Phiroz in the Allahabad graveyard remains unattended and uncared for? I have personally no further knowledge on this point.
I, however, look into Mr. Ghosh’s papers from where I have learnt that Jawaharlal Nehru did setup his legal practice office at Malabar Hill, Bomaby near the then chamber of Mr. Mohd. Ali Jinnah. He was no successful in his legal practice. He had to wind it up as he got involved in a criminal case in which he is said to have attempted to molest a young Parsi girl employed in his office and it is further said that a criminal case against him proceedings the then sessions court of Bombay. He wound up his legal practice and returned to Allahabad and joined the politics of those days.
One Samar Sen a police officer of Bengal was provided by Dr. B.C.Roy (Chief Minister of Bengal who was deputed on the request of Jawaharlal Nehru when has was the Prime Minister to engage in the activities of discovering something against Shri Shama Prasad Mukherjee, he is said to have discovered a painting of Nawab of Oudh standing along side him in his palace at Oudh is a young boy who can be identified as the young Jawaharlal Nehru. There is a further discovery of things by this specially appointed and selected police officer who reported this fact to Dr Shayam Prasad Mukherjee whom he admired as of his fans. He too is dead and his one son now alive is in Canada from whom some important old papers in this context have been received and they have helped the author to briefly set out the facts as above. Any one is welcome to examine the same now in my (R.V.Bhasin, Advocate) possession Further some correspondence of the year 1998 done by one Mr Ram Gopal of Delhi containing theme of his own research and facts found have also come in the possession of the author of this pamphlets. His first issued pamphlet was titled “MRS SONIA GANDHI AND THE NEHRU GANDHI DYNASTY” which has been world widely circulated by the author of this second pamphlets under the title of the “THE TALE OF TWO LALS—MOTILAL AND JAWAHARLAL”.
As before this is published and issued with malice towards none and further facts of important nature are not included in this pamphlets because it is not the purpose of the Author to talk with any intended malice or vulgarity. The author has intended to be brief and objective and has avoided mudslinging on our dead leaders although there is further excitable material that too could be written. The author has confined himself to issue this public interest pamphlets for the benefit of the people of India to know more about their leaders who always lead the people of nations to bad or good future with their built in persona characters. The author does not intent to hurt anyone’s feelings even inadvertently and being and advocate himself fully knows his citizenship responsibilities.
(The contents and other things expressed by Mr. R.V.Bhasin could new or could be counted as malafide intention towards the Nehru Dynasty but reading the above pamphlet by Mr. Bhasin, a Supreme Court lawyer, refreshed the memory what my respected father Shri M.B.L.Nigam (Expired on March 17,2005, at the age of 89years) use to tell. Keeping aside the political career of the Nehru Dynasty, it was one of the most defamed family. If this family had not jumped into the freedom movement, none would dare even to talk and many learned like K.R.Malkani,Governor of Pondicherry and former Chief Editor of Organiser Weekly and of Motherland,daily paper, V.P.Bhatia, Prof. Nand Kishore Nigam, a freedom fighter and the first Council General of India in Kuwait and Trade Commissioner of India in Pakistan et al were also of the same view. Only a serious research and investigations could reveal what is in the sleeves? The purpose to publish this on the web is “lest like other such documents, this pamphlet may not bury in dust.” Because till sometime back I used to suppose this incident as defamatory and one of the cheap argument but at some stages the incidents make me believe.Hence the above Mr. Bhasin's pamphalate.Such documents are rarely available. My purpose is only to keep this pamphlate as record.)