In contemporary India, from time to time, one gets to see posts on social media accusing Nehru of being “unpatriotic” for refusing to accept the offer of a permanent seat in the UN Security Council. The course of history would have been different, they claim, had he accepted the offer.
Nehru-bashing has become a cottage industry. It needs no capital, only willful ignorance of history. However, recently, some eminent writers have also repeated the same claim over and over again. The list includes M.J. Akbar, Brahma Challaney, and Bharat Karnad. Therefore, we need to dig deeper into history.
First, how was the P-5 selected? By 1941, President Roosevelt had concluded that the League of Nations should not be revived as it lacked a mechanism to prevent aggression. He figured out that “Four Policemen” can keep peace in the world. During World War II, the leaders of “The Big Three” — Roosevelt, Stalin, and Churchill – used to meet and take decisions and the rest of the Allies, including the various governments-in-exile in London, fell in line.
Roosevelt’s four policemen were the US, U.S.S.R., U.K., and China, whose leader, Chiang Kai-shek, had high international standing. Stalin was scandalised that an ‘Asiatic power’ should sit in judgment over European powers, but agreed. Churchill protested over the inclusion of China but agreed when Roosevelt agreed to include France. India was nowhere in the reckoning because it was not independent, though it had signed the Charter in 1945 as a founding member.
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