UK -Europe
2016-05-05 / .

Remembering Menon on 120th Birth anniversary..... Krishna Menon's Non alignment Policy was well timed-Sir Peter Lloyd

London: V.K. krishna Menon's 120th Birth anniversary was celebrated at Nehru centre London remembering his contributions and services to the Nation.Function was organised by the V.K. Krishna Menon Institute. Former Home Office Minister sir Peter Lloyed inaugurated the year long celebration. Deputy High commissioner Dr.Verender Paul, Director Of Nehru Centre Srinivas Gotru, Krishna Menon's friends Miss Maureen Travis, Pratap Banaras etc were the prominent Participatns.


opening address was given by V.K. Krishna Menon Institute Director Dr.Cyriac Maprayil.

Menon worked selflessly and tirelessly for the welfare of the local working class people in London-Dr.Cyriac stated. Krishna Menon fought for the cause of social and economic justice-Dr.Cyriac added.


' Menon told them that the British empire to which Britain and India belonged made no distinction between a white working class person living in poverty in London including the slum dwellers who lived behind Kings Cross station at that time and a poor untouchable somewhere in India.

Krishna menon became so prominent a borough councillor that he continuously got elected and served the borough for 14 long years increasing his majority at each successive election

During this period he served on all the council committees and it was on the library committee where he made his mark. He became its chairman in 1945.He used to say that the borough should have as many libraries as there are pubs in the borough. For him libraries did not need to be big buildings but places where books are kept for the public. He opened the temporary branches of the library in different parts of the borough. He also set up atravelling library to take books to the residents who could not find time to travel to the library.

Althogh Menon was living in London he did not forget his people back home in India. Side by side with his other activities he was campaigning for India's independence using various platforms including the labour party, India league and trade union movement .

Menon took on himself the herculean task of educating the British people about India and the need to grant independence to India without further delay. He liaised, interacted, lobbied and even bullied the British parliamentarians of all persuasions to support India's independence from Britain.

One can understand Indians in India marching or holding protest against the British rule. But organising the same in London ,that is,fighting the lion on its own den singlehandedly is unheard of and unthinkable. But that is exactly what Krishna Menon did. The Indian war for liberation was being carried right in to the heart of enemy territory. What he was intending was to awaken the British People as a whole to a better understanding of the movement for Indian independence and that the movement was going to be unstoppable.

Krishna Menon established the India league as an integral part of Indian national struggle. He persuaded well Known intellectuals like the philosopher Bertrant Russel to be its chairman.His work among the people of Britain as well as within the labour party prepared Britain and the labour government to part with power when, of course it became almost inevitable after the second world war'

Referring to Menon's contribution to Indo-British friendship Dr.Maprayil stated that it was Menon who deviced India's foreign policy including the one towards the Commonwealth.

The Blue Plaque erected by the English Heritage is definitely to preserve his memory in the UK primarily in this context .Again Lord Mountbatten stated referring to Krishna Menon 'Menon gave great service to the two countries he loved so dearly. Let neither country forget the debt of gratitude to him.'Labour party leader Michael Foot in his VK Krishna Menon lecture which he delivered in India said 'I want to give thanks to the people of India for giving us Krishna.'

Krishna Menon was the one who helped develop the concept of non -alignment in international relations. In the aftermath of the Second World War nations were polarised into two camps--the communist and the capitalist camps--the newly independent poor nations faced the predicament of having to follow one camp or the other.It was Krishna Menon along with Nehru , Marshall Tito Of Yugoslavia , Kama Nasser Of Egypt and Sukarno Of Indonesia that initiated and launched the Non-alignment Movement.

That made it possible for Krishna Menon to help resolve the Suez ,Congo ,Korean and Indo-China crises. Nehru and Krishna Menon brought a healing touch to International Relations at the height of the Cold War.,


Dr.Maprayil quoted Lord Listowell, Britain's last Secretary of State for India who said:Krishna Menon will be rightly remembered as a great patriot and one of the founding fathers of the Indian Nation.


Concluding his adress Dr.Maprayil stated that V K Krishna Menon had a sense of self respect ,honour and unbending loyalty to India. In simple language he could not be bought or purchased as the British rulers tried to manage even the Rajas of India.He was in other words an untypical Indian in England at a time when most Indians were seen as cooks and coolies of the British Empire.


In his Keynote address sir Peter Lloyd applauded Menon's Secular and socialist approach. He viewed Menon's policy of Nonalignment as a great contribution to the developing and newly emerging nations. But he thought that Menon's policy of non alignment also had immense empowering effect on the newly independent nations in a variety of ways. Referring to the indo china war Lloyd said


India's defeat in the Indo-China's war was 'hard on him', , 'not the kind of payback he was looking for from the Chinese.' But on non-alignment, 'his timing was right,'

'We remember him in his different roles -- a freedomfighter, a scholar, a politician, the first Indian electedCouncillor in the UK, first High Commissioner to the UK andthe first Ambassador to the United Nations,' India's DeputyHigh Commissioner to the UK Dr Virendra Paul said at the event.

'He was a personality who made a huge impact and made ahuge difference,' Paul said












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