Heirs, cartons and access: The journey of Nehru’s letters through a legal tangle

A Gujarat-based historian has recently written a letter to Congress MP Sonia Gandhi, seeking the return of Jawaharlal Nehru’s private documents either to the Prime Minister Museum and Library, which was renamed as the Nehru Memorial Museum and Library in August last year, or give him access to them.

Spanning over the pre- and post-independence period, these documents include Nehru’s personal letters to Jayaprakash Narayan, Padmaja Naidu, Edwina Mountbatten, Albert Einstein, Aruna Asaf Ali, Vijay Lakshmi Pandit, Jagjivan Ram, and Govind Ballabh Pant. His personal documents were segregated from his official papers and removed from the museum in 2008 – by a representative of his legal heir Sonia Gandhi – with official sanction. They can be accessed only with Gandhi’s permission.

The historian, Professor Rizwan Kadri, is also a member of PMML, which is headed by the prime minister. He wrote the letter to Sonia Gandhi on September 11, but said he is yet to get a response. He told Newslaundry that he only wanted access for “research”. 

‘Donor’ to ‘reclaimer’ 

Then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, legal heir of Jawaharlal Nehru, had handed over a tranche of Nehru’s government and private documents to NMML.

In 1982, the Jawaharlal Nehru Memorial Fund, which acts on behalf of Nehru’s heir, informed the NMML that these documents were “intended for safekeeping rather than outright gift”, according to the minutes of the annual general meeting of PMML society on February 13 this year. The meeting was chaired by Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, also vice-president of the society.

Six years later, another set of Nehru documents were donated by Sonia Gandhi – who became the legal heir after the death of Indira Gandhi in 1984 – to PMML for “safe custody”.

“The letter (by Jawaharlal Nehru Memorial Fund in 1988) also indicated that in respect of the papers given by Indira Gandhi given before her death, access and restriction thereon as stipulated by her would continue, and written permission of Sonia Gandhi would be required with effect from March 16, 1988. After getting permission from Sonia Gandhi for access to these papers, the clearance of the government of India was also obtained,” according to the minutes of the meeting in February this year.

But in 1992, Sonia Gandhi informed the PMML that specific permission was required for access as it was difficult to segregate private and official papers. Later, in 2008, MV Rajan, a representative of Sonia Gandhi, visited the memorial and segregated both sets of papers.

“After this segregation was completed, all personal papers, as identified by Rajan and the PMML team working with him, were sent to Sonia Gandhi in 51 carton boxes on May 5, 2008 with the approval of the then director.”

Kadri is not the first scholar to approach Sonia for access. 

Earlier in 2014, another scholar wrote to her, but she replied saying her permission was not required as the collection at NMML was related to the government. “Later…Sonia Gandhi noted that her permission was required only if there were personal papers from 1947-64.”

In 2016, NMML, whose administrative control is with the union ministry of culture, sought a clarification from the ministry over access to the documents that were already at the memorial. The ministry said while NMML is the custodian of the collection, Sonia is the “owner/donor”. It further said that in view of Sonia’s 2014 position, requests for access to papers that were already at the museum could be directly sent to the ministry.

In 2022, this position changed and the director of NMML could grant such permissions.

But unlike these permissions, Kadri’s request to Sonia is related to a set of documents taken back by her representative.

‘No law’ for personal papers

PMML is the largest repository of private papers.

In the February meeting, PMML director Sanjiv Nandan Sahai informed the society members that there was no law that governs private papers. “He informed that while the government files/documents are governed by the Public Records Act (1993), there is no statute governing private papers.” Sahai also informed the meeting that an “internal enquiry” on access to Nehru’s papers had been completed. 

Some members also raised queries on the legal status of private papers. PMML then decided to seek legal opinion on issues like “ownership, custodianship, copyright and use of these archival collections”.

Kadri told Newslaundry that once a person has made a donation, they should not take it back. “Once you have donated something, which is unconditional, you can’t reclaim it. It’s fine that permission is required for access. But the whole purpose for donating these documents was research,” he said.

However, Supreme Court lawyer Rudra Vikram Singh said a person’s right over personal documents is protected under Article 21 of the Constitution.

“If these are personal documents, a person is not bound by any law to part with them even though they had once donated them. Their right over personal documents is protected under Article 21, which implicitly guarantees the right to privacy,” he said. 

Singh said that the custodian could be asked for personal documents only by the court if they are required to decide a case.

PMML director Sahai and deputy director Ravi Kant Mishra did not respond to requests for comment. This report will be updated if a response is received.

Meanwhile, Kadri said he wanted to see correspondence between Nehru and Edwina Mountbatten, the last vicereine of India. 

Asked if such letters could be used to run a smear campaign against Nehru, the historian, who teaches at Swaminarayan Arts College in Gujarat, said, “It is a wrong assumption. Once I read these letters, we may come across something which is contrary to our perception.”

In her book India Remembered: A Personal Account of Mountbattens During the Transfer of Power, Pamela Mountbatten, daughter of Edwina, wrote that Nehru and her mother were “deeply in love” and respected each other. The relationship has been the subject of several conspiracy theories for many years. 

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