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Indira Gandhi, conspiracy of vested interests and emergency

Pro Pradeep Mathur

 

New Delhi | Tuesday | 19 November 2024

Among all the women who have reached the high peak of power in the history of the world, Mrs. Indira Gandhi holds a very special place. If Mrs. Gandhi had not made two mistakes in her political life, she would have probably been the greatest and most successful woman ruler of the world. In  her two tenures as prime minister, which lasted from 1966 to 1977 and then from 1980 to 1984, Indira Gandhi made one big mistake each time. The first mistake was to impose the emergency rule in 1975 and in the second tenure, her mistake was to order the Army action to flush out Khalistani leaders from Golden Temple , the most sacred religious place of the Sikhs. This was an action  which later became the cause of her assassination.

A lot is said about the Emergency. Indira Gandhi has been called a dictator, anti-democracy and what not. Today, even 40 years after her death, Prime Minister Modi's BJP is trying to cash in on it by making it a political issue. Recently, when the opposition alleged that the BJP's rule is authoritarian and Modi ji is taking many decisions that are not democratic, the BJP government retaliated against the Congress and made the Emergency a National Observation Day. It was clear that the issue of Emergency, which has become very old, should be revived again.

Many things are said about the Emergency. But we should understand two things clearly. Indira Gandhi did not impose the Emergency because she wanted to save her chair or because she was afraid of losing power in any way. She actually understood that the movement against her government was a threat to the security of the country. The leader of the total revolution, Jai Prakash Narayan (JP), made this belief of Indira Gandhi even stronger by saying that the army and the police should not obey the government's orders.

Some of her close and very sensible colleagues had suggested to Mrs. Indira Gandhi that there was no harm in imposing emergency and it could be lifted after a few days. The inside story is that when JP's Total Revolution movement was going on, Sanjay Gandhi, who was Indira Gandhi's younger son as well as her close political associate, was very upset. He believed that this movement was coming in the way of the country's progress of which he wanted to be the architect. Haryana Chief Minister Bansilal was very close to Sanjay Gandhi. Sanjay Gandhi talked to him and Bansilal told this to the then Governor of the state BN Chakraborty. Chakraborty sahab told that there is a provision in the Constitution to deal with this problem and by imposing emergency, the entire campaign of Total Revolution can be stopped and the mouths of opposition leaders can be shut.

 

Article at a glance
Indira Gandhi is an important name in world history among women who reached the pinnacle of power. She had many achievements in her political life, but some controversial decisions affected her career.
The imposition of emergency in 1975 and the military action on the Golden Temple in 1984 are the major events of his reign. During the emergency, civil rights were curtailed and opponents were sent to jail, which tarnished his image.
However, his supporters consider it a necessary step for the security of the country. The Golden Temple action ended his life and left deep scars in Indian society.
Indira Gandhi's life shows that a leader is considered great not only by popularity but also by the ability to take decisions by understanding political complexities. Remembering her contribution, we need to maintain the transparency of democracy and the trust of the public.

 

Governor BN Chakravarti was a senior advocate and had a good knowledge of law. He made a note on the provisions of emergency. Sanjay Gandhi went to Indira Gandhi with the proposal. But Mrs. Indira Gandhi did not agree immediately. She was still in a state of uncertainty and so she spoke to the then minister and former Chief Minister of West Bengal Siddharth Shankar Ray to seek his opinion. Siddharth Shankar Ray and Mrs. Gandhi had very old relations, so much so that he used to call Indira Gandhi Indira instead of Prime Minister. Siddharth Shankar Ray was a legal expert and a highly educated scholar. He was highly respected in the intellectual society of the country. When Siddharth Shankar Ray said that there was no harm in imposing emergency, Mrs. Gandhi agreed to this and she told the then Home Minister Jagjivan Ram and emergency was imposed in the country.

After about 18 months of emergency, elections were held in 1977 and the newly formed Janata Party ousted Mrs Gandhi's Congress from power. Both Mrs Gandhi and Sanjay Gandhi lost the elections. We know all these things but the main question is whether the reason for the emergency was only the court's decision under which Mrs Indira Gandhi's Lok Sabha election was found invalid. Let us try to understand the background of Indira Gandhi's political opposition.

After becoming the Prime Minister in 1966, Mrs Gandhi had to face opposition from many old Congress leaders. These were the leaders who had made Mrs Gandhi the Prime Minister or helped her become the Prime Minister with the hope that she would be a weak Prime Minister and they would do as they wished and their hold on the governance of the country would remain intact. But contrary to their hopes, Indira Gandhi proved to be a popular and powerful Prime Minister. She received widespread public support and as a young leader, she completely influenced the new generation. Mrs Gandhi took many populist decisions and started walking on a completely independent line. The old Congress leaders were not happy with this. They started a campaign against Mrs Gandhi. Under this, the Congress also split and the history of internal conflict began.

History is witness to how there was a fight for the post of President after the death of Dr. Zakir Hussain and how Shri VB Giri became the President. But there was another thing behind this which was not noticed. Mrs. Gandhi made it clear that she is with the poor people of India and in this direction she took many economically revolutionary steps like nationalization of banks and closing the Privy Purse. These were a direct attack on the interests of the vested interests of the country which had been maintaining its complete grip on the country's trade and economy. They felt that if they did not oppose Mrs. Gandhi strongly, then it may happen that their grip on the economy and with this grip, their dominance over the country for years may come to an end.

As we all know, in the Indo-Pak war of 1971, Indira Gandhi broke Pakistan, liberated Bangladesh and achieved a big historic victory. After this, the influence and popularity of Mrs. Gandhi started increasing a lot. The opponents of Mrs. Gandhi were very worried about this and they started plotting conspiracies. In the year 1973, Navnirman movement started in Gujarat which was not very successful. After this, the opposition parties of Indira Gandhi caught hold of Jai Prakash Narayan. Jai Prakash Narayan was very close to Nehru ji and considered Indira Gandhi as his daughter, but on some issue, his and Indira Gandhi's ego clashed and Jai Prakash Narayan started the Total Revolution movement against Indira Gandhi.

Jai Prakash Narayan came from a socialist ideology. He was a big name in the establishment of socialism in India. RSS quietly started supporting Jai Prakash Narayan. If today the Sangh Parivar is in power in the country, then its roots come from that movement. They infiltrated Jai Prakash Narayan's Sampoorna Kranti movement and slowly made their place in the country's politics. Some of his people also told Jai Prakash Narayan that communal people of the Sangh Parivar have come into this movement, but Jai Prakash Narayan did not care about this.

Gradually the Sampoorna Kranti movement kept growing. But the limit was reached when Jai Prakash Narayan held a rally in Delhi and even said that the army and police of the country should not obey the government because this government is corrupt. Inciting the police and army to oppose the government was a matter of treason and was really a very serious matter. Then Mrs. Gandhi had to think about taking some steps to deal with this situation and an emergency was imposed.

This decision proved to be wrong. Mrs Gandhi had to suffer the consequences and despite being such a popular leader, she and her son Sanjay Gandhi lost the 1977 elections.

People do not know what was the background of the Emergency. The background was a conspiracy against Mrs. Indira Gandhi which was a joint project of the country's business, economic vested interests and communal forces. In this, they made Jai Prakash Narayan a pawn and despite being a reputed politician, he got trapped in that trap. When the Janata Party government was formed, they forgot Jai Prakash Narayan and his complete dominance ended. After his death, Jai Prakash Narayan did not get any of the things he deserved even though he had initiated the movement that removed Mrs. Indira Gandhi from power.

In the end, we can say that the Emergency happened under special circumstances in the background of which a well-planned conspiracy was hatched against Indira Gandhi. But whatever it may be, it cannot be denied that this was a big mistake of Mrs. Gandhi for which she had to pay the price and the democratic image of the country was tarnished. On the occasion of Indira Gandhi's birth anniversary, we can say that any big leader should not only be a good public representative, efficient administrator and popular person, he should also be aware of all the political conspiracies that opponents with vested interests silently hatch against him.

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Author is a Senior Journalist and Editor of Media Map.

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