No PR campaign can be as effective as dropping dead. Especially for politicians. Suddenly you develop a saintly aura, all your sins are washed away. And anyone who refers to any slightly untoward behaviour by the dearly departed is immediately treated like a pariah. Because in India, especially, there is no greater sin than speaking ill of the dead.

Not on Newslaundry, though. Over here, we believe that the sins of the father must be recounted lest we forget.

On June 11, VC Shukla – “veteran Congress leader” – died from three bullet shot wounds which he suffered from in the May 25th Chhattisgarh attack. He was 84 years old. Going by the new reports which followed the attack and the obituaries which followed his death, you wouldn’t be wrong in believing that Shukla was quite the wonderful statesman – with nary an untoward incident in his political history.

You couldn’t be further from the truth.

First, let’s give credit where due. It is impressive that at his age, Shukla was off campaigning in Chhattisgarh while angling for a ticket for the Mahasamund Lok Sabha Constituency. Forget campaigning for days on end in the most difficult of conditions, most of our grandparents and parents are either dead or have one leg in the grave by this age. Not Shukla. As we all know, if you want a long life all you need to do is join politics. And this elixir of life is what kept Shukla going. So, good on him for bashing on regardless.

What got my attention following the attack on him, was our short-lived memories. Pranab-da, our honourable President, said that, “A veteran Parliamentarian, able administrator and an outstanding statesman, Shri Shukla made valuable contribution to the growth of our nation in various capacities. The nation will remember his contributions and his pursuit of excellence in public life. I had a long personal association with Shri Shukla. In his death, I have lost a friend and the nation an eminent public figure”.

So I thought let me remember his various contributions to the growth of nation and remind myself of his achievements as an able administrator.

Shukla is what we call a career politician. To the manner born. He was the son of Ravishankar Shukla, Madhya Pradesh’s first Chief Minister, and his brother was Congress’ Shyama Charan Shukla, who was also Chief Minister of MP. VC Shukla was elected to the Lok Sabha nine times and was Minister of State under Prime Minister Indira Gandhi from 1967 to 1977 and Minister of State with Independent Charge of Information and Broadcasting – which is when he shone especially brightly as an able administrator. He was also a Cabinet Minister under the Narasimha Rao government during 1991-96. A veteran Parliamentarian indeed.

Before we get to the milestones of his able administration, let’s get to Shukla’s love to hop, skip and jump from one party to another. Despite being one of Indira Gandhi’s favourite henchmen (fondly called the Hatchet Man of the Emergency), he left the Congress in the mid-Eighties and co-founded the Jan Morcha with VP Singh. He was rewarded for this shift in loyalty by being made a minister in the National Front government under VP Singh. He then shifted political affection to the subsequent Chandrasekhar government where he was made External Affairs Minister. After that he returned to the Congress-fold, and became a minister in the PV Narasimha Rao government. He then left the Congress, broke some bread with the BJP, and then again returned for his very final innings to the Congress.

Who needs a firm political ideology when you can have a firm foot in the party in power?

But VC Shukla’s fame is not because of his ability to hop-skip-and-jump from one party to another. No no. His fame is for far more notorious reasons. During the Emergency, when Indira Gandhi decided to shake and reprimand the nation and her detractors into submission, it is VC Shukla who took on the mantle of the desi Goebbels.

Shukla’s brown eyes turned blue for Sycorax and Caliban Gandhi thanks to then I & B minister, Inder Gujral. Sanjay Caliban Gandhi was mortified when Gujral didn’t ensure a live telecast of mummy dearest’s Boat Club rally in 1975. I assume that Caliban Gandhi then rose up and said, “India is mine and Sycorax is my mother and you shall cover all her rallies live” and shunted Gujral out. Which is when lights dimmed. Enter stage right. Shukla. Man of the hour.

Shukla wasn’t a stranger to positions of power. When Indira G had become prime minister in 1966, Shukla was part of her Cabinet. And he’d held many portfolios from External Affairs to Communications, Home, Defence, Parliamentary Affairs, Water Resources, Finance, Planning, Information & Broadcasting and Civil Supplies. But he truly shone in his new position as I & B Minister during the Emergency. There was no stopping him.

He muzzled the press by hook or by crook, whether it be arresting top editors, proofreading and fact-tweaking news reports personally and even going so low as to cut off electricity to printing presses. To say he was petty would be an understatement. Because Kishore Kumar had once refused to perform at an INC rally in Mumbai, Shukla banned his songs from All India Radio and Doordarshan. Any wonder that our government feels that they can monitor websites and block twitter handles and lock up cartoonists? They’re just following in the footsteps of their forefathers. Even Goebbels might not have been as effective as Shukla who played Head Muzzler to the hilt. Fable has it that Sycorax was so impressed with him that she supposedly named Pragati Maidan in Delhi after VC Shukla’s elder daughter.

That’s how you reward an able administrator. By naming a trade pavilion after his offspring. No wonder he refused to kow-tow to her younger offspring, Rajiv. After which his game of Twister began in politics. But for all that he did, Shukla was never able to shake off his Emergency infamy.

Borrowing a feather from Shukla’s career as word-tweaker, the good that Indian politicians do lives after them, while the evil is oft interred with their bones. So it has been with Shukla. Therefore, while most of the media were reporting breathlessly about the attack on him and singing paeans to his status as a veteran statesman, we rarely heard a mention of his turn as Chief Hatchet of the Emergency. He’s now been cremated with full state honours and the Chhattisgarh government has declared state-mourning for three-days. Pardon me if I don’t mourn.