Belonging - A Journey Of Love: Sonia Gandhi's Memoir Out On November 10

Congress leader Sonia Gandhi's memoir will be published this autumn. The book will offer a personal account of her journey from a small town in Italy to one of the central pieces of contemporary Indian politics, and of the love, bereavement and political duty that shaped her life.

Publisher Alfred A Knopf announced on Tuesday that Sonia Gandhi's memoir, 'Belonging: A Journey of Love', will be published on November 10.

The book will explore her marriage into the Nehru-Gandhi political dynasty, the assassinations of her mother-in-law Indira Gandhi and husband Rajiv Gandhi, her entry into politics and her years at the head of the  Congress. 

Sonia Gandhi, 79, says the memoir is an attempt to look beyond the public mythology surrounding one of India's most prominent political families and towards the people behind it.

"Much has been written about my family, but few narratives were able to reach into the truth of their motivations, their actions and even their very human failings," Sonia Gandhi said in a statement issued through Knopf. "In many ways, this book is a homage to their humanness. My story also offers readers a unique perspective of the social and political changes I have witnessed for six decades in the beautiful country of my belonging."

Born in Italy, Sonia Gandhi was a 19-year-old student in Cambridge, England, in 1965 when she met Rajiv Gandhi.

"In this revelatory book, the once famously reticent Sonia Gandhi opens up with warmth and candor to narrate her remarkable life, from her childhood in post-war Italy, to the romance that brings her to India, to the shattering losses that will reshape not only her own future but also that of her adopted home," the books description reads. 

"We witness Sonia's introduction to her formidable mother-in-law, India's first female prime minister: Indira Gandhi. We see Sonia gain confidence by Rajiv's side as she learns to speak Hindi, wear saris, and relish India's cuisine. Rajiv works as a commercial airline pilot, and they raise their two children in the prime minister's house in Delhi," it continues. 

According to the publisher, first major rupture came with the death of Rajiv's younger brother, Sanjay Gandhi, who had been a principal aide to their mother, Indira Gandhi. Sanjay was killed in a plane crash in 1980. Then four years later, on October 31, Indira Gandhi was assassinated by two of her bodyguards in the garden of her official residence in New Delhi.

The memoir describes how Sonia's life was upended by the assassination and by the political consequences that followed. Rajiv Gandhi, who had not initially appeared destined to become India's prime minister, was suddenly thrust into the position after his mother's death.

Seven years later, Sonia Gandhi suffered another devastating loss. On May 21, 1991, Rajiv Gandhi was assassinated during an election campaign in Tamil Nadu. A suicide bomber associated with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) killed him.

"It was heartbreak and loss that threw me into the public world of politics. Up till then I had guarded my privacy fiercely," Sonia Gandhi said.

Her eventual decision to enter politics turned her into a central actor in Indian public life and she went on to become the longest-serving president of the Congress.

"Writing about my life did not come easily to me. It meant opening myself up, sharing moments and experiences I had always held deep inside," she said. "Yet as I gradually removed myself from the political sphere and looked back at all I had seen, the thread of love and loyalty that wove through my story began to define itself."

That thread, she said, runs from her childhood in small-town Italy to her years in India as Rajiv Gandhi's wife and Indira Gandhi's daughter-in-law.

The most consequential phase of her career came after the 2004 general elections, when Congress emerged as the largest party and formed the United Progressive Alliance, with Sonia Gandhi as its leader.

Yet she declined the office of the prime minister.

She chose to lead the Congress-led alliance from outside the government while Manmohan Singh became prime minister. 

The Congress-led government remained in power for a decade and the decision remains one of the defining episodes of Sonia Gandhi's life and is expected to receive particular attention in the memoir.