Closer to Indira

A minister in the dock

Since Indira Gandhi launched what she hopes will be a political comeback three weeks ago (TIME, Aug. 15), official probes of corruption in her fallen regime have been reaching ever deeper into her inner circle--and ever closer to the former Prime Minister herself. First came the news that four top advisers had been jailed on charges of embezzling $7 million from her Congress Party's campaign funds. Then last week the investigators landed their biggest catch so far: ex-Defense Minister Bansi Lal, 49, who was arrested on charges of misappropriating $60,000 from the party's youth wing.

A lawyer and former chief minister of the state of Haryana, bordering Delhi, Lal became Mrs. Gandhi's Defense Minister in December 1975, six months after she had declared the political emergency that eventually led to her downfall. During his tenure, Lal wielded enormous power and acquired a reputation for arrogance and vindictiveness. As a member of the "caucus of four" that surrounded Mrs. Gandhi during the emergency, he enjoyed an influence second only to that of her son Sanjay, another caucus member to whom he was also close.

In fact, it was Lal's Sanjay connection that most intrigued observers of India's gathering political storm. Mrs. Gandhi's son treated the Congress Party's youth movement, whose funds Lal is accused of stealing, as his personal fief. Both have been granted anticipatory bail against possible charges relating to other investigations. Most of the probes are unrelated, but in at least one the two men could be implicated jointly. At issue: whether Lal arranged the sale of state land to Sanjay at below market prices for the construction of a controversial automobile plant, and whether Sanjay illegally used his position to obtain favors for the plant.

Before the magistrate, Lal dismissed the embezzlement charge against him as "just politics" and accused enemies of hatching "a plan to kill me." For its part, an embarrassed Congress Party--which last April expelled Lal for "undemocratic, autocratic and undignified attitudes" during the emergency--leveled undetailed charges of politically motivated torture against the government of Prime Minister Morarji Desai. Throughout the probes, the government has denied allegations of political vendetta.

Late in the week, Sanjay himself was having legal problems. He made his first court appearance and was mobbed by pushing, shoving and shouting young men. The judge granted him bail in one of several cases against him, but Sanjay is expected to be a regular visitor in courts in months ahead. Says one official: "The investigators have more information than they know what to do with."

Indira does not seem to be vulnerable to charges of financial wrongdoing; she has a reputation for caution in her personal finances. But real trouble could come from official studies of abuses during the emergency. Asked if he planned to call Mrs. Gandhi as a witness, former Supreme Court Justice J.C. Shah, head of the most important panel, replied: "If I felt it necessary--and I feel that it is necessary--then I will call her."

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