Nehru considered Tandon to be Hindu- reactionary. Tandon’s image was synonymous with the pro-Hindu lobby within the Congress and he had become a symbol of Hindu revivalism. He was the man who could not become chairman of the Allahabad municipality in 1923 because the Muslims would not support him; Nehru had to be drafted into the job at the last minute. As chief of the Congress Party in Uttar Pradesh (UP) at that sensitive time, Tandon kept making speech after speech demanding that Muslims had to adopt a ‘Hindu culture’, if they wanted to live in India.
