I am just finishing Maharani Gayatri Devi's memoirs, 'A Princess Remembers'.
In the 1962 general elections Gayatri Devi contested on a Swatantra Party (Rajaji's party) ticket and won the Jaipur Parliamentary seat by a margin big enough to earn her a place in the Guinness Book.
Recalling the state of governance in the country at that time, she writes:
"The Congress Party in many parts of the country was beginning to acquire a reputation for corruption and nepotism. In Rajasthan, as in other places, the ministers put their proteges or people who had helped them in the elections in responsible government jobs which they had neither the education nor the experience to fill capably. It was rumoured that when government contracts were assigned to private companies, they were apt to go to whoever gave the minister concerned the most money under the table. We saw the effect of this practice in ordinary things that any tax-payer comes across. The state of the roads, for instance, was deplorable. There were potholes everywhere and in places the rains had washed out the roads entirely. Money had been allotted for repairs but where it went we didn't know."
This was in the late '50s. The only difference since then seems to be that now there are more parties doing the same things.
In the 1962 general elections Gayatri Devi contested on a Swatantra Party (Rajaji's party) ticket and won the Jaipur Parliamentary seat by a margin big enough to earn her a place in the Guinness Book.
Recalling the state of governance in the country at that time, she writes:
"The Congress Party in many parts of the country was beginning to acquire a reputation for corruption and nepotism. In Rajasthan, as in other places, the ministers put their proteges or people who had helped them in the elections in responsible government jobs which they had neither the education nor the experience to fill capably. It was rumoured that when government contracts were assigned to private companies, they were apt to go to whoever gave the minister concerned the most money under the table. We saw the effect of this practice in ordinary things that any tax-payer comes across. The state of the roads, for instance, was deplorable. There were potholes everywhere and in places the rains had washed out the roads entirely. Money had been allotted for repairs but where it went we didn't know."
This was in the late '50s. The only difference since then seems to be that now there are more parties doing the same things.
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