POWER GAMES

When the CBI, on January 16, sought permission to chargesheet top political leaders in the Jain Hawala case, it swept in its dragnet three Cabinet ministers of the Narasimha Rao Government—Balram Jakhar, V.C. Shukla and Madhavrao Scindia—as well as opposition leaders like L.K. Advani and Sharad Yadav. Hawala broker S.K. Jain’s diaries revealed that over the years he had transacted with at least 115 persons, working as a middleman on deals for multinational power companies.

The Jharkhand trap

Former Jharkhand Mukti Morcha leader Shailendra Mahato filed a public interest litigation in Delhi alleging that P.V. Narasimha Rao, Satish Sharma, Buta Singh, Bhajan Lal and others had bribed JMM and breakaway Janata Dal leaders to vote in favour of the minority Congress government in the no-confidence motion it faced in 1993. The CBI looked into the matter in earnest only after Rao left office.

A LONG WAIT

Leander Paes brought India its first individual Olympic medal since 1948, winning the bronze medal at the Atlanta Olympics, beating Brazilian Fernando Meligeni.

FIRST CUT

The BJP secured 160 seats in the Lok Sabha elections to emerge as the single largest party in the house.

The first lung transplantation in India was conducted at Chennai.

The Krem Um Lawan, the longest (6,381 m) and deepest (106.8 m) cave in the Indian subcontinent, was discovered in Meghalaya by an Indo-German expedition.

DID YOU KNOW

In the 1996 World Cup, held jointly by India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka, Anil Kumble was the highest wicket-taker (15 wickets) and Sachin Tendulkar the highest run scorer (523 runs).

“THE RAO GOVERNMENT IS NON-FUNCTIONAL.”
P.V. Narasimha Rao

Rival Congressman N.D. Tiwari might have said so, but despite political complications like Ayodhya, Rao managed to ride through a whole five-year term, banking on his classic trait of not acting until forced to do so. But when the Jain Hawala scandal blew up, followed by Shailendra Mahato’s allegations in the JMM bribery case and renewed activity in the St Kitt’s forgery case of 1990, it was all over, both for him and the Congress.

TWO PMs, ONE YEAR

Politics, in1996, was a fickle game indeed. In what became a mockery of the high office, two men took oath as prime minister, each faltering in time. After the hung Parliament, first it was Atal Bihari Vajpayee trying for a majority as his government was put to vote. But the BJP’s calculations went awry, and the party was unable to make it past the 200 mark. Less than two hours after Vajpayee tendered his resignation, the President summoned H.D. Deve Gowda to lead the United Front to Government. For Gowda, who led the new 13-party coalition, prime ministership was a question of just taking the path of least resistance and sidestepping key elements of the United Front’s radical new agenda.

LALU PRASAD YADAV on the ordering of a probe into the Rs 950-crore fodder scam
“The people will judge whether I am involved in the loot or the one who busted the racket.”

ROUGH CUT

When Shekhar Kapur reconstructed the story of a rape victim who took up arms against the caste system, Bandit Queen met with stiff resistance both from the censors and from the subject herself, Phoolan Devi. It was released in India two years after its release worldwide.

ELSEWHERE...

In Afghanistan, the Taliban captured the capital, Kabul, after driving out President Burhanuddin Rabbani and executing former leader Mohammad Najibullah.

A truck laden with explosives rammed into the main gates of the Central Bank in Colombo, Sri Lanka, killing at least 86 people and injuring 1,400.

Over 100 Lebanese civilians were killed after Israeli forces shelled the United Nations refugee compound in Qana (left).

Thunderstorms and a tornado killed 600 in Bangladesh.

89 was India’s rank amongst 101 developing countries, according to the UNDP’s 1996 Human Development Report. The study said 53 per cent of Indian children under five years of age were underweight, while 64 per cent women were illiterate.

1997: INDIA AT 60

50, AND NOT DONE

REWIND

The slums are still there, but Kolkata’s ‘Saint of the Gutters’ has gone. Eighty-five years old, 50 years of washing the sick and comforting the dying, and yet she was not ready. On September 5, her heart, which had been functioning on a pacemaker since 1989, finally gave up, too weak after a succession of heart attacks in the last few years and too tired after a lifetime of loving. She died as she lived, quietly, and as questions about her canonisation were revived, she left behind an icon that no human heart would deny.

“BY NATURE I AM A SILENT PERSON. I WILL TALK LESS AND DELIVER MORE.”
Inder Kumar Gujral

A replacement candidate for prime minister to start with and the man at the helm of India’s celebration of 50 years of nationhood, Gujral found himself embroiled in problems when he took over from H.D. Deve Gowda. His efforts towards better India-Pakistan relations were lost amid the rumbling of imminent collapse at home. When parts of the Jain Commission report were first published in INDIA TODAY, implicating key DMK members in the assassination of Rajiv Gandhi, the United Front-Congress relationship got severed. The Congress withdrew support and Gujral resigned.

FIRST CUT

Kalpana Chawla became the first Indian woman in space when she blasted off aboard NASA’s space shuttle Columbia on November 19. On her first mission as an astronaut, Chawla travelled over 6.5 million miles in 252 orbits of the earth, logging more than 375 hours in space.

DID YOU KNOW

The Voluntary Disclosure of Income Scheme tax amnesty initiative brought Rs 33,000 crore to the government from declarations by 4,66,031 persons.

38 BULLETS, ONE BODY

The cold-blooded murder of cassette king Gulshan Kumar on August 12 was a grim reminder of Bollywood’s dangerous flirtation with the underworld. Allegedly shot for having refused to pay extortion money to the dons, on that fateful day, his Rs 350-crore empire came to nothing as gunmen pumped 38 bullets into his body.

A NEW GODDESS

“Her narrative crackles with riddles and yet tells its tale quite clearly,” said Gillian Beer, chairwoman of the judges who awarded Arundhati Roy the Booker Prize for The God of Small Things.

Mic-testing Times

In the 50th year of India’s Independence, political debate took on another dimension altogether. In the Uttar Pradesh legislature, the symbolism of the microphone as a weapon was realised as politicians were unable to express themselves in words. With parliamentarians hurling not just abuse but also chairs at one another, India watched, disillusioned by the ungainly show.

ELSEWHERE...

Diana, Princess of Wales (right), was taken to a hospital after a car crash in the Pont de l’Alma road tunnel in Paris. She was pronounced dead at 4 a.m.

The United Kingdom formally handed over Hong Kong to China.

The last of China's major Maoist revolutionaries, Deng Xiaoping, died at the age of 92.

In Roslin, Scotland, scientists announced the successful cloning of the first adult sheep, Dolly, who was born in July 1996.

1,057 people died through the year due to communal violence while another 197 died as a result of bomb blasts. Road accidents claimed another 50,975 lives, while over 350 were killed in more than 20,000 fires across the country.

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