All the Janata men

Apart from giving highly informative, objectively critical portraits of India's new rulers, Janardan Thakur has pulled no punches and is as unsparing a political commentator as he proved himself to be in his earlier work, All the Prime Minister's Men.

A few highlights of the present work are that it probes the depth of Charan Singh's integrity and unfolds the complete drama of Mrs Gandhi's arrest and almost immediate release. Why did it happen?

The book describes Jagjivan Ram, the time bomb, who had the best of two worlds; Raj Narain, the one man band; Bahuguna, the Gogia Pasha; Vajpayee, the lone desert flower; Chandra Shekhar, Young Turk-turned-statesman; and George Fernandes, the firebrand destined to be Minister-in-Waiting. The different roles that Nanaji and Madhu Limaye played in the Janata Party are also described.

All the Janata Men also gives the first authenticated story of how the Janata Party was formed and, more intriguingly, how Morarji Desai was chosen its first Prime Minister. The author goes further and sketches a number of scenarios to speculate who will become Prime Minister after Morarji. Will it be Jagjivan Ram or Charan Singh? Or will the situation change in such a way that a compromise candidate will have to be chosen, say, George Fernandes? Or will even more radical permutations take place and swing someone like Jyoti Basu into

the Prime Minister's chair? A gripping volume, immensely quotable.