"We Fell In Love With Him": Sonia Gandhi On 1st Son Who Died Just After Birth

New Delhi: An account of a child rarely mentioned in public life appears in Congress leader Sonia Gandhi's newly released memoir Belonging: A Journey of Love. The child was the first son she and her husband, former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi, lost more than a year before Rahul Gandhi was born.Sonia Gandhi writes the tragedy unfolded in January 1969, months after her pregnancy had brought joy to the Gandhi household. Former prime minister Indira Gandhi, whom Sonia Gandhi describes as usually restrained in public displays of affection, greeted the news with unusual warmth and hugged her daughter-in-law."One big baby having another baby!" Indira Gandhi said, according to the memoir.The excitement would not last as Sonia Gandhi went into labour two months before her due date and delivered a baby boy prematurely on January 18, 1969. Though born too early, the newborn appeared healthy."I heard the baby's first cry as he was placed in the incubator. Later Rajiv took me to see him, a tiny, perfectly formed boy, with thick, black hair and long, slim fingers," she writes. "We fell in love with him immediately," she adds.The child survived only a few hours and Rajiv Gandhi had already been warned by doctors that the infant's chances were uncertain. The following morning, the couple received the news."'No it was not possible! Why, why,' I kept asking. Both of us were shocked and heartbroken," she says.The memoir says that Rajiv Gandhi broke down and cried alongside her despite what she calls his "stiff upper lip" upbringing. Indira Gandhi, who was travelling at the time, cut short her tour and rushed back to the hospital."She embraced us, her eyes red and swollen," Sonia Gandhi writes, recalling that the former prime minister sat with the grieving couple before reluctantly resuming official commitments.The family's anguish continued as they had a debate over how the infant should be laid to rest. She says traditional practices for newborns left her horrified when the possibility of consigning the body to a river was discussed."'No,' I whispered. 'No matter what, I'm not going to allow our baby to be thrown into the river.'"The prospect brought back a disturbing memory of seeing a body trapped near Delhi's Okhla barrage, making the idea impossible for her to accept, Sonia Gandhi writes. The family decided to bury the child at Feroze Gandhi's farm in south Delhi's Mehrauli and Rajiv Gandhi and his younger brother Sanjay conducted the burial beneath a pink bougainvillea bush."It was a painful and agonising option, but there was no other way. For a long time we'd pause and place a flower over the spot each time we went there," she says of the loss that left a deep mark and made her struggle for months with feelings of grief and guilt.READ | Sonia Gandhi's Interview With NDTV In 2004, Now Seen From Her Memoir's LensShe writes that a vicious attack by a rightwing publication questioning the legitimacy of the child "scarred" her heart."The venom of those words scarred my heart. How could people be so cruel?" she says in the memoir about the episode that was one of the defining personal tragedies of her early years in India, long before politics became the centre of her life.Later that year she became pregnant again, though the experience left the family anxious rather than celebratory. That pregnancy resulted in the birth of Rahul Gandhi on June 19, 1970.