| Hereditary princes are used to waiting to claim their thrones. The British King Edward VII, for example, had to wait over forty years before he could become king on the death of his mother Queen Victoria in 1901. Prince Charles, after a similarly long period, is still waiting. |
| Democratic heirs-apparent are not usually as patient and understandably so for they do not have the same confidence in the inevitability of their inheritance. They prefer to stake their claims while the memory of their father or mother is still fresh and marketable. No plebeian dynasty has applied this principle more assiduously in modern history than the Nehrus, who have provided India with a succession of leaders spanning three generations – Jawaharlal Nehru, Mrs. Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi – with the possibility of yet a fourth, Rajiv’s daughter Priyanka. Her heir-apparency though may well be the longest in that uncommon family, for she is young and inexperienced, and by the time she has an opportunity to encash her legacy, her vote bank may well be overdrawn.[EXTRACT] |
Published in THE NATION 17 June 1993, and reprinted in THE ARMLESS QUEEN (1994). |
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