(With reference to  Priyanka Gandhi’s March 19th visit to Nalini, serving a life term in Vellore Central Prison for involvement in the assassination of Rajiv Gandhi) What must she have been thinking? She must have planned the visit to the last detail, the papers say it was her attempt to bring to closure the violence of the past. I wonder how she must have felt when she actually stood next to her, the woman who had planned in similar detail, a meeting of a very different kind….. After her questions, short and well thought out, were asked, and answers obtained, after the initial tears and awkwardness, they even,(the papers say) discussed motherhood, that greatest of  levelers and shared labour room stories, mothers both, knowing parental concern even as one is jailed for killing the parent of the other. This is why India is such a great civilization……and why we should be proud to be Indians…our traditions are ingrained in us, however Westernized we may appear. This act of looking at your father’s assassin in the eye, and condoning her is an Eastern response to tragedy. Priyanka is clearly her mother’s daughter, echoing the same values. (Nalini was on death row but Sonia Gandhi had appealed for clemency on the grounds that she had a five-year-old daughter. Nalini was then given a life term.) To go beyond the hatred and accept the accused,to view her out of that terrifying context and respond to her with gentleness and civility (Nalini apparently felt ”cleansed” after this meeting), to the extent of making small talk shows great generosity of spirit and a realization of the futility of carrying bitter negativities. Priyanka spoke to the newspaper who got wind of her visit and said “I do not believe in anger, violence or hatred and I refuse to allow it to overpower my life.” Words of power and hope, especially since they come from a  young politician. Way to go, Priyanka Gandhi Vadra.