IAF plane was used to ferry Nehru's European mistress in 1950s: Swamy

Hours after Prime Minister Narendra Modi accused former PM Rajiv Gandhi of using an aircraft carrier for his vacation over 30 years ago, another BJP leader has raised allegations of misuse of military equipment against Jawaharlal Nehru, the country's first prime minister.

BJP Rajya Sabha MP Subramanian Swamy, one of the most outspoken critics of the Nehru-Gandhi family, on Thursday tweeted that an Indian Air Force plane was used to “ferry one of Nehru's European mistresses” in the 1950s. Swamy alleged his father-in-law, J.D. Kapadia, who was then defence secretary, had been transferred for refusing to allow this.

Swamy tweeted “Namo citing Virat misuse recalls for me the case of my father-in-law J.D. Kapadia ICS who as Defence Secy in the 1950s refused to give Air Force plane to ferry one of Nehru’s European mistresses. Of course he was transferred and next Secy okayed. Thus the decline be began.”

On Wednesday, at a election rally in New Delhi, Modi alleged Rajiv Gandhi had used the aircraft carrier INS Viraat as a “personal taxi”. He claimed, "INS Viraat was insulted by using it as a personal taxi. This happened when Rajiv Gandhi and his family was out for a 10-day vacation. INS Viraat was deployed for securing our maritime boundary. But it was diverted to take the Gandhi family, which was out for a vacation.”

Interestingly, following Modi's allegations against Rajiv over the misuse of the INS Viraat, BJP supporters and other social media users shared images of Nehru along with Indira Gandhi and her two sons on board a warship. Nehru and his family had travelled on the Indian Navy cruiser INS Delhi on a state visit to Indonesia in June 1950.

Swamy has been a trenchant critic of Sonia Gandhi and her son and successor as Congress chief, Rahul Gandhi. Swamy had pursued the National Herald case against Sonia and Rahul and also levelled charges Rahul was a British national.

Swamy had previously accused Nehru of having relationships with foreign women. In January, Swamy had tweeted that “the building in Shimla where Nehru had his illicit affair with Edwina (Mountbatten)” has been declared a national monument, while the Ram Setu was not. Edwina was the wife of the last viceroy of India, Louis Mountbatten.

In 2018, Swamy had alleged Edwina was behind the decision of Nehru's government to refer the Jammu and Kashmir dispute to the UN 70 years ago. Swamy had then tweeted, “Jammu Kashmir State after merger was arbitrarily and without cabinet approval referred to UN by Nehru at Edwina's urging...”