We know too that the killing discredited the doctrine of hate that had gathered new strength following the carnage in West and East Punjab in August-September ’47. Across the subcontinent Hindu and Muslim extremism suffered a severe blow.
Yet though Providence used the death designed by his killers to frustrate their goals and to advance those of Gandhi, a Gandhi living in the late ’40s and ’50s would have helped (a) to heal India-Pak relations and (b) to correct the sarkar-janata equation in India and in doing so give the Congress a role very different from what was seen after independence.
Right from August 1947, Gandhi had wanted to visit Pakistan. On September 23, he said, "I want to go to Lahore...I want to...