And then…India

Phillips Talbot

In India, as elsewhere, Don McLean contributed vision, practicality, and precision to the imaginative concepts that illuminated John D. Rockefeller 3rd’s great decade of institutional bridge-building across the Pacific. By 1958 the revived Japan Society along with the new Population Council, International House of Japan, Council on Economic and Cultural Affairs (later to be divided into the Agricultural Development Council and the JDR 3rd Fund), Asia Society, and Magsaysay Award Foundation were all in place and had begun to make the marks that distinguished each of them in the ensuing generation. John and his associates, notably including Don McLean, had tailored each to a specific, recognized need. But as yet they had not directly approached India.

Still newly independent in the 1950’s, India was a very large and obviously important country that had initially drawn John Rockefeller’s interest through its classic arts. In time John had pondered the value that India, which was opening fresh and wide international contacts, might gain from an International House, possibly modeled on the lines of the Tokyo House. He had hesitated to mention his interest to India’s leaders, however, because he knew how the pride of a new nation left them sensitive about foreign involvement in their national life. Thus, during a visit to New Delhi in February 1958, he was particularly pleased when India’s renown philosopher - and Vice President - and later President - Dr. S. Radhakrishnan, described how impressed he and Prime Minister Nehru had been by their earlier visits to the International House of Japan. It would be useful for India to have a similar institution, Dr. Radhakrishnan said. Could Mr. Rockefeller, out of his experience with the Tokyo House, prepare a memorandum outlining some of the functions such an establishment might have in India?

Mr. Rockefeller could and would. He cancelled onward travel plans in order to extend his stay in India and, on the same day, cabled Don McLean asking that he join him in New Delhi as soon as possible. When Don arrived a week later John had completed the memorandum. John and Don then called on Dr. Radhakrishnan, who was enthusiastic about the idea.

Thus was born the conception of what Srimati Kamaladevi Chattopadhyay has recently called “this rare institution,” the India International Center. Over the ensuing decades this Centre has brought together widening circles of Indian and foreign scholars and educators, journalists, diplomats, national planners, and others. Its library, auditorium, and conference facilities, its rooms for visiting residents, its restaurant and lounges and its beautiful gardens on a five-acre plot adjoining the splendid Lodi Gardens have become one of India’s primary intellectual and cultural centers.

For years were to intervene between the original Radhakrishnan/Rockefeller talks and the opening of the India International Centre on January 22, 1962. Throughout those years the principals, including Dr. Radhakrishnan's senior Indian associates, relied heavily on Don McLean's capacity for problem focused analysis, careful and sometimes delicate negotiation, and skilled drafting. But from the early months of Don's relationships in India went beyond those of a lawyer engaging in a constructive negotiation. He and the Indian men and women with whom he worked formed a collegial friendship that endured through later years.

I recall, for example, Don's association with Dr. C.D. Deshmukh, a distinguished educator and at the time head of the Indian University Grants Commission. When Dr. Deshmukh accepted Vice President Radhakrishnan’s request that he take the lead in organizing an international house in New Delhi, Don became his liaison with the Rockefeller interests. Dr. Deshmukh and his associates took Don into their confidence as they discussed the proposed institution’s functions, program patterns, desirable facilities, site and finances. In return he offered his own appraisals passed and along the experiences of other Rockefeller-related organizations in addressing similar matters. In frequent visits to New Delhi he helped them put their dreams and plans in words that would have meaning to international funding organizations, notably the Rockefeller Foundation and the JDR, 3rd Fund. All the time he kept John Rockefeller informed of the progress being made in New Delhi. As a perceptive go-between, he helped each end of this collaboration better to understand the outlook, possibilities, and difficulties of the other. In the process a friendship group and Don and his wife Martha became warm friends of Dr. and Mrs. Deshmukh.

Two images of Don's Indian connection remain strong in my mind. One derives from New Delhi. On announcement of Don’s impending arrival the pace of activity among the planners of the center would pick up. Dr. Deshmukh with his colleagues Dr. P.N. Kirpal, Laxmi Jain, the architect Joseph Stein, and others would ready themselves for discussions. Having come halfway across the world Don would then turn up without apparent travel fatigue, briskly settle down to consideration of one issue after another, offer his suggestions or criticisms or approval, and talk of the tactics of moving onto the next stage. In a country where many things move slowly, he was able at the end of almost every visit to report progress.

My other image is of Don in New York, reporting on the projects development in New Delhi. He would explain everything about the Indian’s achievements and difficulties to John Rockefeller, of course, and to those of us who were trustees of the JDR, 3rd Fund. He would also convey his impressions to officers of the Rockefeller Foundation, and possibly to others. His analyses were always clear-eyed. The Indians were approaching the project differently from the earlier, successful, organizational experience of the International House of Japan. But Indians were not Japanese, and Don would explain how in the Indian context their contrasting ways might also workout successfully. His interpretations of the Indian process had much to do with the acceptance by New York-based trustees, many of whom had little Indian experience, of assistance request from New Delhi.

Throughout the development of the plan for the India International Centre, Don was concerned that the question of appropriate leadership receive adequate attention in New Delhi. The total commitment of Dr. Shigeharu Matsumoto, its director, had been the key ingredient in the strong position attained by the International House of Japan. In India Deshmukh had felt that this other commitments would not permit him to play a similar role, though his interest was deep. Yet the more Don worked with him, the stronger he came to feel that the future of the Centre might well rest on getting Dr. Deshmukh wholly involved not just in the planning stage but in its ongoing operations. John Rockefeller agreed. , and Don arranged with Dr. Matsumoto that Dr. Deshmukh be invited to the International House of Japan as a distinguished lecturer. This experience and the encouragement of his Indian colleagues and American friends resulted in 1961 in Dr. Deshmukh’s taking over full leadership of the Center.

Don's responsibilities in the development of the India International Centre were completed by the time of its opening in 1962. Yet he retained his strong interest in the project. When he traveled to India years later, in 1976, on a mission for the Population Council and the Agricultural Development Council, Don and Martha stayed at the Center for several days. He later reported that he was impressed by the way it was operating, by its seminars and discussion groups, and by its role in India's national cultural and intellectual life. He was pleased also buys widening attraction to international academic and professional visitors to India.

Those of us who have resided in the India International Center in the 1980’s can confirm the value of the institution. The Center functions as a wholly Indian institution whose origins Americans can be proud to have been associated. 

To describe Don McLean’s role in India as that of a technician is accurate, but wholly inadequate. To be sure, he helped put proposals into language that would meet lawyers needs. He could, and did, help structure budgets in ways that could be understood by American foundation executives. He Interpreted Indians’ and Americans’ thought processes to each other.

Yet his real contributions went beyond those formal responsibilities. In India as elsewhere he was a Johnny Appleseed of ideas. He somehow managed to convey what had worked in one situation to those seeking a solution to problems in another. He hacked away at lack of realism in planning yet was able to shore up courage and optimism at the moments of discouragement that inevitably afflicted projects of this size and complexity. Indians paid him the complement of returning the favor.

Phillips Talbot was a fellow trustee of the JDR, 3rd Fund and cooperator in several Asian-related Rockefeller projects.  United States Ambassador to Greece 1965 to 1969, and before that Assistant Secretary of State for Near East and Southeast Asia, he was also an educator and writer who had been a journalist in Asian affairs for nearly 50 years.