Sir Anerood Jugnauth | Obituary
SIR Anerood Jugnauth was born in 1930 at a time when the Arya Samaj was spreading the fundamental teaching of the primacy of truth and righteousness over everything in Mauritius. As a child, Anerood adhered religiously and philosophically to these values as the guiding principles of his life. He doggedly followed the path of truth. Often being frank — and sometimes even dry in his words — whenever he smelt the lies, cheats and trickery of others.
Right from his childhood days, he had to bear with injustice and brutality whenever his step-mother laid a trap to catch him so that his father would always unbuckle his belt to give him a sound beating. He had learnt the lesson early in life. He could smell a trap and escape it by sometimes diving to hide under the bed. Thus, he had learnt the fundamental lesson that in life, one has to live with injustice lurking around, in different guises, ready to pounce on one for some unsuspected agenda. The life-long lesson he learned was that one has to stay hidden from the enemy and observe his moves and intentions by keeping a safe distance from the trap. This childhood lesson and experience would consequently mature into his own life-long strategy to stay in political parties to the very end until victory was won by keeping oneself safe from the hidden enemy.
This aspect of his life had ensured his survival and lasting triumph. It represented the uniquely Jugnauth strategy in prevailing over extremely dangerous situations not only to himself but fundamentally to save the country and people from falling irreversibly into perdition.
Later on, as a politician and a shrewd observer of life, when faced with powerful political forces – using lies, bluffs, hypocrisy, and cheating in their armoury to attain their political ends – he wisely preferred to observe their games by keeping a safe distance by non-participation. In his heart, he held sincerely to the ideals of democracy, national interest, peace and progress above any other consideration. Thus when the stake was high, as concerns national interest or the issue was binding on the future of the country, he could boldly and sometimes heroically step forward to voice his opinion based on stark and irrefutable arguments. To him, the ultimate stake in everything was the triumph of truth over untruth.
Whenever he suspected his party was undermining national interest or the future of the country for its narrow political game, he stepped forward boldly to uphold the truth and the national interest even to the extent of unmasking the silent wolf dressed in sheep’s clothing.
In the following section, we shall elaborate on two historical examples to demonstrate Jugnauth’s unique ability to survive over extremely risky operations which not only saved his skin but the very survival and growth of the nation.
Among the many characteristics which distinguished Jugnauth from other politicians, we may single out a few, namely: he stayed close to the people, knew their problems and wants. He thus kept into intimate contacts with his electorate at grass-roots level, meeting them in cultural, socio-religious programmes since the very beginning. This rare feat explains his reputation as the giant killer when he defeated Aunauth Beejadhur, in the 1963 elections at Riviere du Rempart. But how did he do it? He identified with the people from below because he was born in humble, semi-rural conditions. This enabled him to engage with them easily, to know their needs, problems and aspirations. He was sincere and truthful in his desire to stand by them. This fired his determination to serve the country. At the wider national level, he emerged as a champion of independence, fighting the anti-independence campaign led by Sir Gaetan Duval – leader of PMSD.
The crucial test took place in the 1965 London Constitutional Conference when Jugnauth as, the deputy leader of IFB, stood firmly for independence despite the reserve of his leader, Sookdeo Beesoondoyal who expressed his reluctance to vote for independence under a Labour Government. While the other IFB delegates meekly agreed with Beesoondoyal as they were afraid to broach the subject with their leader, Anerood Jugnauth stood up and warned Beesoondoyal and his delegates that if they dared to go against independence, the Mauritian electorate would slap them with slippers. However, since Sookdeo Beesoondoyal never spoke for independence, it was Jugnauth who stood up boldly as the IFB spokesman to say: “IFB is categorical. We’re 100% for independence!”
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