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Top leaders of Iran were assassinated in 1951 and 75 years later in 2026 several key functionaries occupying high positions in that country including Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and security chief Ali Larijani were decapitated by brutal military assaults of US and Israel in blatant violation of the UN Charter.

Reasons behind assassinations

Then in 1951 Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru was sensitive enough to take note of those tragic killings in Iran and on March 21 that year, in a letter to chief ministers, he wrote, “In Iran recently, there has been the assassination of the Prime Minister General Ali Razmara and later, another Minister Abdul Hamid Zangoneh.”

“Behind these bloody deeds,” he with anguish remarked, “There lies apparently the story of oil, ever an unsavoury business.” He then proceeded to observe, “Iran is in a troubled and unstable state and Great Powers look upon her great oil resources with greed. A party in Iran and indeed the Majlis (parliament) also have declared for nationalisation of oil.”

Nehru’s sharp observations that the bloody violence snatching away lives of top leaders of Iran could be attributed to the incessant greed for its oil resources by great powers got echoed in the statement of US President Donald Trump who in an interview with Financial Times on March 29, 2026 bluntly stated, “To be honest with you, my favourite thing is to take the oil in Iran” and suggested that “the United States could seize Kharg Island, the country’s main oil export hub.”

 Therefore, Nehru’s utterances of 1951 that “Behind these bloody deeds, there lies apparently the story of........

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