Durga Das was a journalist and freedom fighter. His book India From Curzon To Nehru and After comes with a foreword from none other than Zakir Hussain, former President of India. In his book, Das relates a rather interesting episode. Some time before the Indo-China war in 1962, Nehru allowed himself to be persuaded by Gulzari Lal Nanda, the Planning Minister, to show his horoscope to an astrologer. But he flew into a rage (scientific temper?) when the astrologer told him that he would have to face an attack from China that very year. Of course, one wonders whether one really needed star charts and astrologers to predict that. Dr Ambedkar, Sri Aurobindo and Sardar Patel had predicted a Chinese aggression years before it happened. But for Nehru, it needed an astrologer to warn him. Yet, independent India’s first Prime Minister, with his scientific temper rising, shouted: “This can never happen! You are talking bilge!”