Wednesday, April 08, 2015

"Oh, he was a delightful old chap."

says Ghani Khan about Gandhi. And "I used to talk to him about my shikaar [hunting], about girls. Once he said to Father[Khan Abdul Gaffar Khan, Frontier Gandhi] Have you been bloodthirsty like him when you were young? Father said no no, he told him a lie and said I have never shot a bird even. Because father used to go for shikaar. Every winter we used to go for shikaar."

"So he sent for me from Hazari Bagh jail [in Bihar, India], and he took my return ticket and put it into his pocket and he said go to Jawaharlal [Nehru], and he sent me to Jawaharlal. Jawaharlal had just come out of prison [ May 1941]. He told him that I had become Americanized and please teach him the simple life and everything. So Jawaharlal looked at me and said, you look simple enough, damn you. I was about 22.
went there and he had only Indira, who later became Prime Minister. She was about 14. So I lived with them. He did not have any sons. So I sort of became his son. I lived there for nine months. Then he sent me and Indira to Tagores University, Shantiniketan [in Bengal]."

" I had had a fight with him[his father]. I did not agree with his program. I am a bit of a socialist. I begged him to make an economic program. I told him Sir, there are eighty steps between communism and conservatism. Stand anywhere, choose any mixture, either way, nearer communism nearer conservatism, wherever you like but stand somewhere for heavens sake, and say this is my stand on economics. All these boys, I mean all the fellows who went with him to jail, their grandsons have passed BA and MAs in economics and political science. They keep on asking what is your economic program? And he said nothing. "
P.S. More here (via Chapati Mystery) http://tns.thenews.com.pk/private-world-of-ghani-khan-son-of-bacha-khan/#.VSS78RjXeK3 and here https://orbala.wordpress.com/2014/11/02/pashtun-personality-of-the-week-ghani-khan-philosopher-poet-sculptor/

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