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Boris Johnson faces a test of character

My long absence from this column was because I spent last month in the UK, partly to hold a Khushwant Singh Litfest in King's College, London University (my father, Khushwant Singh's alma mater). It has been held for the last seven years in the Himalayan town of Kasauli, where he had done much of his writing. We decided to try it out in London, at the urging of King's College. Another reason why London was a good venue was that Khushwant Singh was passionate about improving ties between India and Pakistan (he was born and brought up in what is now Pakistan) by greater people-to-people contact. At the first few litfests in Kasauli, we managed to get some eminent Pakistani writers over, thereby fulfilling my father's dream. However, with relations between the two countries deteriorating, Pakistanis found it difficult to get visas for India, especially for Kasauli which is a military cantonment (the same was true for Indian writers wanting to attend litfests in Pakistan). Great pity. Terrorists don't cross borders with visas. But try telling that to politicians and bureaucrats. So London became a natural and neutral venue where writers and intellectuals from the two countries could meet and share ideas. And, hopefully, move forward.
But this column is not about the Litfest. It is about an intriguing British politician who dominated the news when I was in England and with whom I have a certain personal connection. I am referring to Boris Johnson, the flamboyant, often indiscreet, former foreign secretary in the Conservative government. With the recent resignation of Theresa May as UK's Prime Minister, the way was paved for the election of a new leader. Boris was the front-runner, mainly because he had been a very successful Mayor of London and also the main driving force for Britain's exit from the European Union (Brexit). In the past few days he has managed to decimate his main rivals until only the Foreign Secretary, Jeremy Hunt, was left.
Johnson was widely expected to defeat Hunt - until a dramatic event took place about a fortnight ago that made it to the front pages of virtually every British newspaper and became the main topic of discussion on the TV channels. A noisy row with his current girlfriend, who is 24 years younger than him (he is 55), riled his neighbour. He recorded the fracas and summoned the police who, after finding out that neither Johnson nor his GF had complained, left the scene. But the nosey neighbour informed the Press, which of course went to town the next morning. When confronted by the media and his political rivals at a TV debate about the incident, Johnson said it was a private matter and he did not want to comment on it. The trouble with that excuse is that public figures, especially in the West with its free-wheeling media, are constantly under scrutiny, even over their private lives.
Now let me come to the personal connection.
Though they have announced they are divorcing, after 25 years of an obviously rocky marriage and four children, Johnson's wife, Marina, is half-Sikh. In fact, her mother, Dip Singh, who is still alive, was married to my father's youngest brother. The marriage did not last long and Dip met and fell in love with the distinguished BBC correspondent in Delhi, Sir Charles Wheeler. They had two daughters, Marina and Shirin. A graduate of Cambridge University, Marina Wheeler is a highly accomplished lady in her own right. She is a Queen's Counsel, an honour that is bestowed on a barrister only on the recommendation of the Lord Chancellor. Despite her husband's serial infidelities, she stuck it out with him for almost three decades and must have been majorly instrumental in his spectacular, flamboyant rise to close to the pinnacle of power.
Her links to India go deeper. Her mother's sister married another of my father's brothers, which means two sisters married two brothers. So Marina has a platoon of cousins in India and visits them when the occasion arises. She is even writing a book on the Indian part of her family. Boris, too, has made several private visits to India, hence knows the country well. If he becomes the next leader of the Conservative Party, he will be the first British PM ever to have such strong Indian links, and I believe he would help in promoting Indo-British ties. But that is a big if, after his latest dalliance and the questions it has raised about his character. British society and sensibilities have moved on from the conservative primness of Victorian times, but nevertheless, there are limits that Boris Johnson may have crossed.
Rahul Singh is a former Editor of Khaleej Times