“I started as a skeptic”: Author Vinay Gupta couldn’t believe story of Jews’ rescued by his grandfather

Author Vinay Gupta’s book ‘A Rescue in Vienna: The Story of an Unlikely Saviour’ is the journey to uncover the truth about his grandfather’s heroic actions during World War II is a fascinating one.

Gupta’s grandfather rescued five Jewish families from persecution, but Gupta initially didn’t believe the story. “I started as a skeptic,” he said, thinking it was just a family legend. However, after digging through India’s National Archives, which had recently been digitized, Gupta discovered that the story was indeed true.

Speaking about his book, which was launched last month, Gupta told ANI on Thursday that it was about his grandfather who rescued five Jewish families to save them from persecution.

“I started as a skeptic. I didn’t believe the story when I heard bits of it from my mother. I thought this was all a mistake because I thought oh, this must be Britishers, right? They are colonial administrators. I thought those pictures must be of Britishers. So my initial thought was to try and get to the bottom of the story so that my family would stop talking about it”

“It was surprising when I got to know that it was true. And you know timing is everything. The Indian government had just digitized the National Archives. So even sitting in America, I could log in and find lakhs of files going back to the 1850s. So it was quite a journey about trying to get to the bottom and then actually meeting one of the people who lived in my grandfather’s house, the house that I remember playing in, still alive in Florida. And then I started going down every year, we’d go meet him every year. It was quite a gratifying story,” he said.

Vinay Gupta was hosted by Austrian Ambassador to India, Katharina Wieser, where he talked about his family memoir.

Gupta’s grandfather had placed an advertisement in a local Austrian newspaper, seeking people willing to relocate to India. This revelation was surprising, even to Gupta’s own family, who had no idea about the extent of their grandfather’s humanitarian efforts. What’s remarkable is that Gupta’s grandfather never spoke about his actions, unlike many others who would have sought recognition.

“The story was that there were two or three Jews that were living in Ludhiana that my grandfather rescued. Later, it turned out there were five families. They did not know that. My own family didn’t know that. I found out in the National Archives. Then how did they come here? They didn’t know that. All my mother and my aunts knew was that they were living there,” Gupta said, adding, “I found out that he had put an advertisement in a local Austrian newspaper looking for people who would relocate to India. All this was new information that even my family didn’t know. They were just as surprised. They didn’t believe it. So it was quite a revelation. And because my grandfather never talked about it, it’s surprising. Most people who do something like this talk about it. He was a very quiet man. He never wanted to discuss it,” he said.

Gupta said that India is one of the few countries that has never harbored anti-semitic views. It was just the British colonizers that held this view. But, it is interesting to note that they kept Jews as prisoners in their own country, but treated Jews in India better than Indians themselves.

“Some of the anecdotes are how, India is one of the few countries in the world that has not had, at least not by Indians, anti-semitic incidents, except for instance that one time where these terrorists came from Pakistan and attacked a Jewish house in Bombay. Indians have not done it. We have been very good about it. But what was interesting is that the British controlling India were more negative towards Jewish families than Indians were. But still, they treated them as Europeans. the fact that they were still superior to us Indians Even though they were prisoners- the fact that you would build a prisoner camp in Dehradun, in the mountains above Pune it’s a ghost of the mentality even at that time,” he said.

The Ambassador of Israel to India, Reuven Azar also lauded the work of Vinay Gupta and said that it’s a story that is worth to be told and promised the author to send his book to Jerusalem for the researchers of the Holocaust in Jerusalem to read it and to follow it up.

“I was delighted to come here today to the Austrian Ambassador’s residence and I congratulate the ambassador for hosting Vinay Gupta who has written the amazing story of his family that rescued five Jewish families from Vienna after the Nazis took over Austria. The Jewish community in Austria was a formidable community with businessmen, academicians, with doctors who unfortunately have been exterminated by the Nazis. Some of them managed to escape. And each one of these stories is a story that is worth telling. I heard with admiration the amazing story of Gupta’s family. Mr Gupta was not only an entrepreneur but was a person with a huge heart. Thanks to his goodwill, many souls were saved during the Holocaust. So it’s a story that is worth to be told. And I promised Mr Gupta that I’m going to send his book to Jerusalem for the researchers of the Holocaust in Jerusalem to read it and to follow it up. And I’m really thankful for this opportunity to be here today…,” said Azar.