On Wednesday (February 25), Union Minister Piyush Goyal targeted Congress leader Rahul Gandhi over his “compromised prime minister” jibe, and used the tag to describe former prime ministers Jawaharlal Nehru, Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi on the social media site X. Gandhi had criticised Prime Minister Narendra Modi over the US-India trade deal framework and other issues.The BJP leader also alleged that Nehru “repeatedly compromised” national interests as prime minister. “Nehru also wrote to the United Nations advocating for China’s permanent membership in the UN Security Council, despite India itself being a claimant to that position,” he said.This is hardly the first time that the issue of Nehru favouring China for the UNSC seat has come up. The late Arun Jaitley, for instance, had brought this up in 2019 and called India’s first prime minister “the original sinner”. Many critics of Nehru have described this as a missed opportunity for India.While it is indeed true that Nehru declined feelers from the US in 1950 and the USSR in 1955 to assume permanent membership of the Security Council, one cannot ignore the nature of these proposals and the geopolitical considerations of that time. Here’s a look at what really happened at that time, and why Nehru championed the cause of China at the Security Council.First, what was happening in the Security Council?The United Nations was established towards the end of World War II (1939-45). The UN Security Council, a principal body tasked with decision-making on key international issues, had five permanent members: The US, the UK, the Soviet Union, France and China.In 1949, however, China saw a momentous change in leadership, from a nationalist government to a Communist one. Mao Zedong announced the creation of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) on October 1, 1949, ending the full-scale civil war between the Chinese Communist Party and the Nationalist Party, or Kuomintang. The conflict began in the late 1920s, in a post-imperial China, and was paused during World War II. After its resumption, the Communists emerged victorious.Explained | How China’s communist state was established on October 1, 1949India was keen to maintain its autonomy from the US-led camp and chart an independent foreign policy, amid the early days of the Cold War between the US and the USSR. It was also the first non-Communist nation to accord diplomatic recognition to the PRC.Story continues below this adThe permanent Security Council seat, however, was still held by the Republic of China (RoC) government that was established after the end of imperial rule in China, led by the Kuomintang. After the Communists won, the leaders of the party fled to the island of Taiwan.Several Western nations did not wish to recognise China’s new Communist establishment, seeing it as an ally of the USSR. In fact, to protest the blocking of the PRC from taking over the RoC UN seat, the Soviet Union walked out of the UN in mid-January 1950, before returning later that year.It was amid these tensions in the world body that two proposals came for India — one from the US in 1950 and the other from the USSR in 1955. Let us look at both proposals separately.What was the US offer?In 1950, the US reached out to the Indian Ambassador, Nehru’s sister Vijayalakshmi Pandit, about India taking the RoC’s place in the Security Council.Story continues below this adIn late August 1950, Pandit wrote to her brother from Washington DC about her conversations with US diplomats. “One matter that is being cooked up in the State Department should be known to you. This is the unseating of China as a Permanent Member in the Security Council and of India being put in her place… Last week I had interviews with [John Foster] Dulles and [Philip] Jessup…. Both brought up this question and Dulles seemed particularly anxious that a move in this direction should be started,” she wrote. Jawaharlal Nehru at the UN General Assembly, New York, in 1948. (Wikimedia Commons)Within a week, Nehru responded: “So far as we are concerned, we are not going to countenance it. That would be bad from every point of view. It would be a clear affront to China and it would mean some kind of a break between us and China.”Nehru also wrote that India would continue pressing for the PRC’s admission in the UN and the Security Council. He acknowledged that India was certainly entitled to a permanent seat at the Security Council, “But we are not going in at the cost of China.”The informal US offer also came at a time when the Cold War tensions were spreading to Asia, with the rise of the Communist government in China and war breaking out on the Korean peninsula in June 1950. US and allied troops were backing South Korea, and China and the Soviet Union were supporting the North Korean forces.Story continues below this adLikely encouraged by the fact that India had backed US resolutions at the UN calling for collective action to thwart North Korea’s aggression, the US State Department reached out to India, hoping to bring it within its sphere of influence.In a 2015 paper, historian Anton Harder wrote: “This approach to India by the US State Department, though informal and not quite at the highest level, should nevertheless be regarded as quite sincere. Even if, as with the Soviet ‘offer’ a few years later, the prospects of this offer actually coming to fruition were unlikely, it could still be seen as a significant display of a desire in the US for a more trusting relationship with India.”And what was the Soviet offer?In 1955, Soviet leader Nikolai Bulganin told Nehru that the USSR was considering “suggesting at a later stage India’s inclusion as the sixth member of the Security Council”.In Explained | Why China called ceasefire in a war it was winning against IndiaUnlike the US proposal, the Soviets did not want India to replace the RoC. They wished to keep the door open for their Communist ally. Nehru, however, turned him down, saying such a move would have required a revision of the UN Charter, and the timing was not right.Story continues below this adThe offer also appears to have been more of a feeler than a concrete proposal. This can be seen in Bulganin telling Nehru: “We proposed the question of India’s membership of the Security Council to get your views”.Nabarun Roy, an assistant professor at South Asian University, wrote in a 2018 paper: “On knowing Nehru’s reservations, Bulganin agreed that the time was not right for making changes at the Security Council and that India’s case could be pursued only after the Chinese case was addressed.”Harder, citing legal scholar A G Noorani’s 2002 defence of Nehru’s decision, wrote: “Noorani argued that Nehru was correct in making little of this offer, as the offer was in fact unlikely to materialize in reality; and even if the Soviets were sincere about facilitating India’s accession to the Security Council as a permanent member, this would have caused major problems for India’s overall foreign policy strategy by complicating its relations with China and the major powers.”In September 1955, Nehru stated in the Lok Sabha: “There has been no offer, formal or informal, of this kind… The composition of the Security Council is prescribed by the UN Charter, according to which certain specified nations have permanent seats. No change or addition can be made to this without an amendment of the Charter.”But why did Nehru back the PRC?Story continues below this adNehru did not want India to get drawn into a conflict with a neighbouring country on account of the US geopolitical strategy. But his backing of the PRC had considerations beyond the bilateral relationship. As Roy writes: “It was rooted in his observations about the state of great power relations in general.”History headline | When Nehru first met Mao, discussed the United States as a shared concern: ‘The US is not mature…’Nehru believed in the need for cooperation among the “great powers” for international stability. Should a great power like the PRC be shunned, it could trigger a war.“Early twentieth-century developments had taught him that great powers that were ostracized became a source of instability. In an era that saw the unveiling of nuclear bombs, the cost of a dissatisfied PRC would be tragic. To stabilize the system, it was necessary to accommodate PRC within the Security Council and provide it with the veto. This would assuage PRC and check its revisionist tendencies,” says Roy’s paper.Nehru’s support for the PRC was, therefore, also part of an attempt to maintain the balance of power among nations.Story continues below this adIn his 1950 letter to Pandit, Nehru also expressed apprehension that if the PRC failed to get into the Security Council, it could lead to the Soviet Union and some other countries quitting the UN altogether. “That may please the State Department, but it would mean the end of the UN as we have known it. That would also mean a further drift towards war.”It would take until 1971 for the UN to finally recognise the PRC as the legitimate government of China.