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Economic Times
28-06-2025
- Politics
- Economic Times
How the Emergency makes us immune to democracy damage
Agencies Representational Each year at midnight, June 25-26, I wish my mother a very happy birthday. This year, I was late by 15 minutes as I got caught up 'doing the dishes'. I've put that in quotes not because 'doing the dishes' is a euphemism for some nefarious midnight activity involving my sole contact in the PMO, but because putting something like that in quotes can immediately arouse the suspicion of said O, and keep them on their toes. The thing is, my mother's birthday falls on the anniversary of the Emergency. She turned 33 a few minutes after president Fakhruddin Ali Ahmed signed and sent back the draft declaration using provisions of Article 352 of the Constitution to impose an internal emergency. Looking at Abu Abraham's famous cartoon - published some six months into Emergency - of Ali Ahmed stretching out from a Rashtrapati-tub to return pen and paper to an outstretched hand 'symbol' behind the door, I suitably-bootably wonder whether such a cartoon would have passed today. Not so much for its critique of an obsequious nominal head of state, as much for its depiction of a president in his birthday suit. So, even being the luckiest guy to have the least authoritarian of mothers, my mum's birthday is inextricably linked with Emergency. As Srinath Raghavan's illuminating new biography, Indira Gandhi and the Years That Transformed India, reveal, an emergency under Article 352 was already in place since December 1971 during the Bangladesh War. But Mrs G wanted a new emergency - her One Big Beautiful Emergency, if you will. Much before June 12, 1975, when Allahabad High Court found her guilty of corruption in the March 1971 general election - a case filed by Raj Narain of Samyukta Socialist Party, whom she defeated by more than 1 lakh votes at Rae Bareli - Gandhi 'came to regard the dangers posed by the RSS' activism as linked to an American-supported attempt at destabilising her government'. Assassination of her aide, cabinet minister, and Congress fundraiser LN Mishra in January 1975 didn't help matters. Gandhi wanted to crack down on RSS, and Ananda Margis, by invoking an all-encompassing emergency even before the Allahabad High Court verdict. As Raghavan reminds us, 'Far from being lawful, the declaration of emergency on 25 June 1975 was a coup d'etat: in the original sense of the term a 'master-stroke of the state,' whose signature elements were surprise and secrecy.' Like every year, the media and its content-providers rolled out thoughts on the Emergency this year, too - the one day that LK Advani is taken out of the freezer and thawed for his 'bend-crawl' aphorism. But for all the righteous horror poured on 'the day democracy died', 50 years on, the Emergency has a new function: as insurance against any charge that India today could possibly be anything other than a model democracy. One extremely handy thing about any 'darkest chapter in history' is that it allows 'dark chapters' to come across as gentle gambols in the park. Take the Jewish holocaust. After that particular Nazi pol science field study, you seriously reckon Israel can be charged of genocide for its 'tough love' with Gaza? With countries like Germany falling for it faster than you can say, 'Fast and the Fuhrious', the upper-cased 'Holocaust' is brought out like garlic and crucifix to drive away any accusation of lower-cased 'holocaust' being carried out by Israeli ghetto-blasters. The same principle holds with our Emergency. Mention any current dodge'n'damage to democratic institutions by the state - whether GoI or state governments - and 'Emergency' is trotted out like Asrani with a toothbrush moustache. Umar Khalid, almost five years in Tihar without a trial, charges against whom have yet to framed in court? 'Pfft. That's nothing compared to what happened during the Emergency'. The other standard rebuttal being, 'Have you seen Pakistan?' Which is why, after 'doing the dishes' with Pontius Pilate diligence, and wishing Ma on Thursday, I realised why so many people are horrified by Donald Trump, his ICEmen, executive orders, sending military to quell protestors, using social media telepathy to weed out bad apples from entering America, his sycophantasmagoric coterie... Poor things, they have no Indira's Emergency to measure Trump's Urgency against, and find phew-relief like we do. (Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this column are that of the writer. 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The Hindu
26-06-2025
- Politics
- The Hindu
Revisiting Emergency through images
It has been 50 years since the Emergency was imposed on June 25, 1975. It lasted all of 21 months, coming to an end on March 21, 1977. Its impact, however, has lasted longer. The Emergency era remains fresh in the minds of the public, with politicians and academics invested in the constitution and polity of the nation. 'The long 1970s were the hinge on which the contemporary history of India turned, transforming the young postcolonial country into today's India,' author Srinath Raghavan said in a recent interview with The Hindu. His book Indira Gandhi and the Years That Transformed India is only one of many recent works aiming to demystify these years and what transpired. Only recently, Coomi Kapoor's The Emergency: A Personal History received an uncertain Bollywood treatment in the form of Kangana Ranaut's similarly titled film, which received a lukewarm response. As several narratives exist — political, academic, imaginative — there exist some undeniable facts and turning points during this era. We take a look at some images published by The Hindu, which sought to capture the zeitgeist — before, during and after the Emergency era. Also read: Revisiting a dark chapter: 50th anniversary of Emergency declaration ARCHITECTS OF THE EMERGENCY: Prime Minister Indira Gandhi with President Fakhruddin Ali Ahmed, when she called on him on August 21, 1974. Mrs. Ahmed is at left. On her cabinet's advice, President Fakhruddin Ali Ahmed proclaimed Emergency under Article 352 citing 'internal disturbances'. Photo: The Hindu Archives THE MARCH THAT SHOOK MRS. GANDHI: Socialist leader Jayaprakash Narayan is seen seated outside the locked gate of the Patna Secretariat while leading the anti-corruption movement in Bihar in October 1974. As JP began touring more states, he also united several anti-Congress parties and the protests against Indira Gandhi government grew, which was seen as a prime reason for her recommending the Emergency. Photo: The Hindu Archives JP's MOVEMENT: JP leading a 'march to Parliament' in Delhi in March 1975. His movement brought an end to the Congress rule at the Centre for the first time in 1977. Different political parties came together under the banner of his Janata Party to provide the country its first non-Congress government. Photo: The Hindu Archives GUJARAT REVOLT: Morarji Desai (centre) sat on an indefinite fast to press for early election in Gujarat. Elections were held in June and for the first time and the only time, Gujarat threw a hung Assembly verdict. Two weeks later, Emergency was imposed. RAILWAYS STRIKE: This image, which later became a symbol of the state of Emergency, was taken when trade union leader George Fernandes was arrested during the all India railway strike in May 1974. Fernandes led the agitation demanding pay revision and eight-hour work shifts for railway workers. Despite his arrest, about 70% of railway workers stayed off from work, bringing the country's largest PSU to a standstill. A LEGAL BATTLE LOST: Indira Gandhi lost the legal battle in the Allahabad High Court in a petition filed by Raj Narain (in picture), challenging her election in 1971 from Rae Bareli in Uttar Pradesh. The conviction meant she ceases to be an MP. EMERGENCY IMPOSED: The first page of The Hindu dated June 26, 1975, reports President proclaiming Emergency, on its front page. WHEN A CM PROTESTED: Karunanidhi, then the Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu, distributes handmade pamphlets to public near Anna Statue in Mount Road to protest press censorship during Emergency. On July 12, 1975, he addressed a mass meeting on the Marina Beach in Madras, declaring there was neither an internal nor external threat to India and called upon the vast concourse to take a pledge to defend their freedoms. His government was subsequently dismissed. This image was taken from a photo display at Kalaignar Karuvoolam. Photo: M. Vedhan THE STORY OF THE UNSEEN: When JP was addressing a meeting in Vijayawada against the Emergency in 1975, three three youngsters - Yalamanchali Sivaji, Yarlagadda Lakshmi Prasad and Kambhampati Hari Babu - can be seen. All of them became MPs subsequently. Sitting in the audience, but missed in the click is a young man who was among several people arrested for opposing the Emergency. It was M. Venkaiah Naidu, who went on to be the Vice-president of India. This picture was shared with The Hindu by Dr. Sivaji. Photo: Special Arrangement DMK FACES THE WRATH: Young DMK leaders M.K. Stalin, Arcot Veerasamy, Murasoli Maran were among those detained in MISA. C. Chittibab, former Mayor of Madras, died in custody while trying to protect Stalin. Photo shows the cell at the erstwhile Madras Central Prison where Chief Minister M.K. Stalin was detained under the Maintenance of Internal Security Act during the Emergency. THE GOVERNMENT NARRATIVE: In this image shared by the Press Information Bureau, some of the members of the Indian community in London, called on Indira Gandhi, in New Delhi on September 15, 1975. They had participated in the massive demonstration in support of Emergency measures and against the distortions by the British press and BBC. Photo: Special Arrangement THE JANATA GOVERNMENT: Morarji Desai (left) talking to L.K. Advani (right) while Jayaprakash Narayan watching them, in New Delhi on January 22, 1977. This photograph wouldn't have been possible prior the Emergency given their political views. But the anti-Congress leaders joined hands to form the Janata government, handing out Congress its first defeat at the Centre. Moraji Desai became the Prime Minister, L.K. Advani, the I&B Minister, while JP chose to stay away from electoral politics. Photo: The Hindu Archives ENDING EMERGENCY: Indira Gandhi called for fresh elections in March 1977 and released all political prisoners. The picture shows Ms. Gandhi meeting leaders of the Opposition parties in New Delhi on January 28, 1977. NEW LEADERS RISE: The Emergency gave birth to a new wave of politicians, Chandra Shekhar being a prominent face. He and Atal Bihari Vajpayee, who were ministers in the Janata Government, eventually became prime ministers.
Hindustan Times
21-06-2025
- Politics
- Hindustan Times
Blinded by devotion to power and her son
Wednesday is the 50th anniversary of Indira Gandhi's Emergency. Her most authoritative and profound biographer, Srinath Raghavan, whose book Indira Gandhi and the Years That Transformed India is published this month, believes the Emergency was 'the single most traumatic experience in independent India's political history'. Today let's remind ourselves of how terrible it was. The truth is, as Srinath Raghavan's book points out, Indira Gandhi never thought very highly of democracy The cold facts of the Emergency are chilling; 34,988 people were detained under the Maintenance of Internal Security Act whilst 75,818 were arrested under the Defence of India rules; practically the entire Opposition was jailed; the press was censored; the Constitution brutally amended; and even the judiciary accepted that the right to life had been suspended. At the height of the Emergency, LK Advani wrote in his diary that Indian democracy was over and done with. At the time, most people would have agreed with him. There can be little doubt that the Emergency was declared to protect Gandhi's political career after the Allahabad High Court struck down her election and the Supreme Court only gave her a conditional stay. Her claim that it was necessary because the Opposition was trying to paralyse the government and Jayaprakash Narayan had called on the Army and the police to disobey orders was just a trumped-up excuse. Raghavan believes the actual declaration of the Emergency on June 25, 1975 was 'a coup d'etat'. First, under the Constitution there can only be one emergency at a time and in 1975 there was already an external emergency going back to the Bangladesh war of 1971. Second, under Article 352, the President can only proclaim an emergency on the written recommendation of the council of ministers. President Fakhruddin Ali Ahmed didn't wait for that. He did it at the Prime Minister's personal request. Third, the mass arrests and the cutting of power to newspaper establishments on the night of June 25 /26 'had no legal basis and were done entirely at the behest of the Prime Minister'. At this point let's ask if Indira Gandhi was justified in claiming there was an 'imminent threat to the security of India'? The Intelligence Bureau had not submitted any such report nor did the state governments convey such information to the Union home ministry. So, did Indira Gandhi make up and manufacture this alleged internal threat? It seems like it. The truth is, as Raghavan's book points out, Indira Gandhi never thought very highly of democracy. She once wrote to the violinist Yehudi Menuhin: 'Democracy is not an end. It is merely a system by which one proceeds towards the goal. Hence democracy cannot be more important than the progress, unity or survival of the country.' Most people remember the Emergency for the two campaigns it is closely associated with – sterilisation and slum clearance. Both had at their head Gandhi's younger son, Sanjay. And both destroyed the credibility of the Emergency and Gandhi's personal reputation. Yet so dependent was Indira Gandhi on Sanjay that she was blind to this. She's even on record claiming he was like an elder brother. Certainly, she considered him her strongest and most loyal supporter after the Allahabad High Court verdict. As her principal secretary, PN Haksar, points out: 'She was absolutely blind as far as that boy was concerned.' To everyone's astonishment, in January 1977 Indira Gandhi called elections even though they weren't due for another year. It led to the collapse of her rule and the end of the Emergency. Did she do it because she thought she could win and legitimise the Emergency? Or was this a way of accepting it was a mistake and getting off the tiger's back? The truth is Indira Gandhi never apologised for the Emergency nor accepted it was a mistake. She only regretted aspects of it which she considered excesses. Asked by Paul Brass on March 26, 1978: 'Would you have done anything differently in relation to the Emergency?', her answer began with the word 'No'. It couldn't have been more pointed. Karan Thapar is the author of Devil's Advocate: The Untold Story. The views expressed are personal
The Hindu
19-06-2025
- Politics
- The Hindu
Review of Srinath Raghavan's new book on Indira Gandhi
Srinath Raghavan's latest book, Indira Gandhi and the Years That Transformed India, examines her political career as India's long 1970s. It takes a chronological arc: her assumption of prime ministerial office in 1966, her struggle to take tight control of the Congress party, her landslide electoral win of 1971, thereafter her leadership of the country in the war with Pakistan, the imposition of Emergency, loss to the Janata Party in 1977, her stint in opposition, return to office in 1980 and her assassination in 1984. Placing this extended decade in a global context, Raghavan argues that 'the long 1970s were the hinge on which the contemporary history of India turned, transforming the young postcolonial country into today's India.' In an interview, Raghavan explains various ideas and events that marked these tumultuous years. Excerpts: In this political history of the Indira Gandhi years, a word that recurs repeatedly is Caesarist/Caesarism. In your view, is it central to understanding the changes that she oversaw, and how it transformed the Indian polity? Caesarism refers to a style of politics in which the leader seeks directly to connect with the people, bypassing party structures or the parliament. I found it useful to understand an important change in the Indian politics ushered in by Indira Gandhi – more useful than currently modish terms such as populist or charismatic. Democratic politics has, by definition, an element of populism. And charisma is only one aspect of the Caesarist style of leadership. Was she already inclined to the Caesarist style? Did her style shift-shape along the way? Indira Gandhi adopted this mode of leadership in response to the specific problems confronting the Congress party. The party's drab performance in the 1967 elections underlined its inability to carry with it significant sections of the electorate. At the same time, it accentuated the power struggle within the party between the prime minister and the regional grandees who controlled the machine. Indira Gandhi moved towards a Caesarist style both to undercut her rivals in the party and revive its electoral fortunes. Her decision to split the Congress was undoubtedly a crucial first step. But equally important were the extraordinary performance of her party in the general elections of 1971 and the decisive military victory over Pakistan later the same year. These, in turn, propelled the party to a massive win in the State elections of 1972. None of these could have been predicted when she broke the old Congress. But cumulatively they cemented her control of the party. Without such dominance it is difficult to imagine the party tamely falling in with her decision to impose the Emergency in June 1975. The triumphs of 1971-2 to the imposition of Emergency in 1975 and the rapid consolidation of the Emergency regime — do you see a vein of risk-taking running through the entire arc? Or did, as in the popular view, fortitude give way to paranoia? I don't see her as an inveterate risk-taker. Rather she had a sharp, instinctive grasp of power relations (whether in domestic or international politics), an instinctive sense of timing and a willingness to make bold choices. These qualities worked for her in the crises of the early years, but they also led to counterproductive outcomes in later years—not only the Emergency but also her handling of the problems in Punjab, Assam and Jammu and Kashmir during her final term in office. All along, she tended to blame difficult situations on the machinations of her domestic or international opponents. This made her somewhat impervious to introspecting on her own choices and their consequences. Yet, as her bete noire Henry Kissinger once said, even the paranoid can have real enemies. You write that 'the long 1970s placed the Indian economy on the road to liberalisation, if only via a crooked path'. Do you think this point remains little appreciated? Indeed. The received wisdom on Indira Gandhi's economic policies is that they were 'socialist' and they tightened the grip of the state on private capital. This is true, but it is also a partial picture. In fact, the heyday of nationalisation and state control in the early 1970s proved brief, though it was damaging enough. The embrace of these policies coincided with the onset of a global economic crisis triggered by the collapse of the Bretton Woods system of stable exchange rates and the oil shocks that followed the Arab-Israel war of 1973. Such was the impact of this global crisis on the Indian economy that Indira Gandhi was forced to embrace conservative macroeconomic policies and move in the direction of liberalising controls on the economy. Before and during the Emergency as well as in her last term in office she adopted strong anti-inflationary policies. During these periods, she also espoused pro-business policies — policies that were viewed favourably by established players like J.R.D. Tata and newer entrants like Dhirubhai Ambani. In so doing, she put the Indian economy on the long road towards liberalisation. The tenure of the Janata Party was a vital phase of the long 1970s. How much was Indira Gandhi a defining factor in the manner and pace at which the regime unravelled? The Janata government was united in its desire to fix Indira Gandhi after 1977, but divided on how best to proceed. This led to some spectacular own-goals such as the abortive move to arrest her in 1978. Indira Gandhi, for her part, proved more astute in playing on the faultlines within the Janata Party and on the thrusting ambition of some of its leaders. In particular, her move to support Charan Singh's bid for premiership ensured that the Janata Party was broken beyond repair or rapprochement. How important were these years out of power, 1977-1980, in her own eventual evolution? These were undoubtedly the most challenging years of her political life. Yet, her ability to retain a grip on a section of the Congress party, to revive her popular fortunes by dramatic moves (such as in support of the Dalits after the massacre in Belchi), and to bounce back by winning the 1978 by-election in Chikmagalur — all showcased her political instincts and tenacity. At the same time, these years also led her further down the path of personalising power in the party (which she split for a second time) and of relying on her younger son, Sanjay Gandhi, who was clearly the dynastic heir apparent. You conclude that while the Janata government had successfully rolled back the Emergency, it did not reconfigure the coordinates of parliamentary democracy put in place on Mrs. Gandhi's watch. Yet, did its record inform the coalition governments to come in later years, of the 'third front', BJP, and the Congress? The Janata government certainly foreshadowed the era of coalition politics that began in the late 1980s. While several of the main protagonists of this period were active in 1977-79, it is not clear they had learned much from that bitter experience. Rather, the record of some of the later coalition governments bore out the dictum that the only thing we learn from history is how to make new mistakes! You choose not to speculate about the reasons for her announcement of elections in 1977. But did this announcement embed in the Indian political system the centrality of elections? The outcome of the 1977 elections demonstrated that even the most powerful political leader could be unseated and humbled. Coming in the wake of the Emergency, when institutional checks and balances had manifestly failed to uphold democracy, elections were now regarded as central to Indian democracy. A decade ago you had published a profile of Indira Gandhi - from then to now, has your assessment of the arc of her prime ministerial career altered? My assessments have changed in a couple of ways. The availability of newly declassified archival materials, including from the Prime Minister's Secretariat, has enabled me to understand better the ideas and impulses that lay behind many of the choices and decisions made by Indira Gandhi and her contemporaries. This is true even of such well known episodes as the nationalisation of banks. At the same time, I have developed a deeper appreciation of the gulf between intentions and outcomes, and how the latter were decisively shaped by the wider, including the global, currents of the long 1970s. At the outset of her premiership, for instance, Indira Gandhi wanted to restore the economy to the track of planned economic development (on the Nehruvian model). But the economic imperatives and crises of the period effectively led to rather a different model of political economy — one that combined targeted anti-poverty programmes with a liberalising, pro-business outlook. This framework has proved durable and continues to shape Indian political economy today. The interviewer is a Delhi-based editor and journalist. Indira Gandhi and the Years That Transformed India Srinath Raghavan Allen Lane ₹899
