To Indira Gandhi

On the occasion of Indira Gandhi’s 98th birth anniversary on November 19, 2015 we remember her by reproducing the following poem written a year after her death (she was killed on October 31, 1984) and published in Mainstream (November 16, 1985).

a year has passed

 

without you;

 

tears dry up

 

on the surface,

 

but the pain persists

 

down below

 

where my heart writhes

 

like a wounded fawn

 

as it dawns on me

 

with every passing day:

 

how much we lost

 

by losing you.

Sumit Chakravartty

New Delhi October 31, 1985