Hari Nath Rai was relentlessly pursuing his scoop of the century to expose the proclivities and propensities of Jihad, the so-called Muslim holy war. He was also an assiduous critic of the country’s dictatorial and spuriously secular regime. which often landed him in detention. Ironically, he was also petrified of pain inflicted to chasten him for assiduously criticizing the extra-constitutional emergency regime for its tyranny, corruption, opaqueness and flawed administration. But that did not deter him from pursuing the truth about the mindless carnage culture of Jihad and soul-stifling brutality of the intoxication of power.
Chander Mehra, 83, journalist-editor-columnist- author. Hospitalized for seven years, he has worked in senior positions in India and Africa . He has survived through trying times during the regimes of African tyrants as well as during the Emergency in India.
In one African state, he was detained without trial thrice because his commentaries were inimical to the dictatorial regime. Even today, he is a “Prohibited Immigrant” in the Immigration Department’s voluminous file on him. The manuscript of his book, Good Governance: The Great Debate, was seized by the special branch, and is lost forever.
In India, during the Emergency, he was detained for editing the manuscript of Jayaprakash Narayan’s Total Revolution, an anthology of the since deceased Loknayak who needs no introduction Because of his struggle for emancipation from colonial rule as well as anti-people policies in post-independence India.
Chander Mehra’s published books include: Corruption: Dealing with the Devil, and a novel Jihad Rediscovered, banned by some Islamic states.