Margaret Thatcher's connect with India

New Delhi, April 8: Three years before 'Iron Lady' Margaret Thatcher became Prime Minister of the

, she visited

in 1976 to call on

who had invited her. The connect with Gandhi, she felt is "sympathy towards a woman politician faced with the huge strains and difficulties of governing a country as vast as India."

Although Thatcher in her memoirs said that she 'did not see eye-to-eye on Gandhi's emergency and the restrictions on the press', she said that she 'found herself liking Mrs Gandhi'.

"In spite of a long self justificatory account she gave me of why the state of emergency had been necessary, I could not approve of her government's method,"she said.

"I lunched with Indira Gandhi in her own modest home, where she insisted on seeing that her guests were all looked after, and clearing away the plates while discussing matters of high politics," Thatcher, wrote in "The Path to Power".

"Both her sons, Sanjay and Rajiv, were present, although it was the former who had most to say for himself. He had, indeed, allegedly been responsible for many of the abuses such as forced sterilisation and compulsory re-housing which had provoked such bitter opposition," she said.

In the British archives that were released in 2006, Thatcher's particularly appreciated Gandhi 'clearing the plates herself'.

Margaret Thatcher passed away on Monday. She was 87. She died of a stroke.

OneIndia News (With input from IANS)