Sonia Gandhi's memoir sparks row over Operation Blue Star: Here’s how AAP, BJP reacted
New Delhi, November 10, 2026 (ANI): The release of Sonia Gandhi’s memoir "Belonging: A Journey of Love" ignited a sharp political row on Tuesday, drawing simultaneous attacks from both the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) over its framing of Operation Blue Star and UPA-era governance.
The memoir, published by HarperCollins in India, went on sale on Tuesday. It traces Sonia Gandhi's journey from her childhood in post-war Italy and her romance with Rajiv Gandhi at Cambridge to her life in India and the personal losses that shaped her bond with the country, including the assassinations of Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi.
Reacting to Gandhi's account of Indira Gandhi’s post-Operation Blue Star reflections, AAP Delhi President Saurabh Bharadwaj dismissed the narrative as an attempt to "help people move past these wounds".
"Sonia Gandhi is now attempting, in her own way, to help people move past these wounds. However, had Indira Gandhi herself expressed such remorse at the time, it would have carried far greater significance. This sentiment, coming from Sonia Gandhi, is merely hearsay—it cannot be independently verified. It should be viewed as a political statement tailored to the current political climate," Bharadwaj told ANI.
Bharadwaj said Sonia Gandhi had "probably now come to realise" that the deployment of the army into the Golden Temple, an operation involving cannons and artillery, along with the "open massacre of Sikhs on the streets of Delhi," casts serious doubt on the Congress party's secular credentials.
Rajya Sabha MP Satnam Singh Sandhu questioned Sonia Gandhi recalling that Indira Gandhi was filled with remorse seeing the aftermath of operation Blue Star.
"This is a dark chapter in history that Sonia Gandhi has mentioned in her book. Now she has said that when Indira Gandhi found out, when she saw the pictures of the Golden Temple, she felt remorse and she had tears in her eyes. But my question is, after seeing this scene of devastation, those tears in Mrs. Indira Gandhi’s eyes, who will take responsibility for that devastation? Who is responsible for it? To date, Congress has not taken responsibility for it. And the perpetrators of that, the aftermath of that, the massacre of the Sikhs, who is behind them? If there were remorse, like Sonia Gandhi has said that before Indira Gandhi passed, she had the realization, the feeling that her death was imminent. And she had told her family how they have to handle themselves. So, firstly, my question is, was that remorse for the injustice that happened to the Sikhs? Was it for the attack on the Golden Temple, or was it about her own political decision? " he said.
June 6, 1984, marked the day when the Indian Army, under Operation Blue Star, stormed into the Golden Temple on orders of the then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi to contain Sikh militancy under the leadership of Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale in Punjab. It was reported that Bhindranwale had stashed large quantities of arms on the Golden Temple premises.
Bhindranwale was the head of the radical Sikh outfit Damdami Taksal. He, along with his armed followers, was killed during Operation Blue Star, launched by the Indian Army to flush out the militants from the Golden Temple complex in June 1984.
The Operation was heavily criticised. Months later, Indira Gandhi was assassinated by two of her Sikh bodyguards, Beant Singh and Satwant Singh, at her New Delhi residence on October 31, 1984.
BJP MP Bhola Singh alleged that former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh was a "namesake" leader in a government run by remote control.
He said there was "a great deal of material available" on her personal life and political activities, including "how she controlled the Congress party and ran the government."
On the memoirs recounting of Operation Blue Star, Singh charged the Congress with a "recurring pattern" of abuse of power.
"It is a fact that the atmosphere in Delhi and Punjab at that time, where Sikhs were dragged from their homes and killed, reflects a recurring pattern in the Congress party’s modus operandi. Whether it is imposing the Emergency or inciting riots, the Congress has consistently shown a willingness to go to any lengths in its hunger for power," he said.
In her memoir, Sonia Gandhi recalled that as Indira Gandhi watched a video of the aftermath of the Opeartion. "As my mother-in-law watched the slow moving record, i could see her face wet with tears-tears of pain and regret, I think: sorrow at the manner in which the seige has ended, at the large number of lives lost." she wrote. (ANI)