Indira Gandhi

Indira Priyadarshini Gandhi (इन्दिरा प्रियदर्शिनी गान्धी) (November 19, 1917 – October 31, 1984) was Prime Minister of India from January 19, 1966 to March 24, 1977, and from January 14, 1980 until her assassination in 1984. She was one of modern India's most important political leaders.

Emergency

Main References: Indian Emergency, Jaya Prakash Narayan, Sanjay Gandhi

Related Topics:
Indian Emergency - Jaya Prakash Narayan - Sanjay Gandhi

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Indira's government faced major problems after 1971. Sycophancy enveloped her administration, leaving the Congress Party entirely dependent on her leadership for its election fortunes. Socialism and a burgeoning bureaucracy brought major inefficency and corruption into the national economy and administration. The Green Revolution was transforming the lives of India's vast underclasses, but not with the speed promised under Garibi Hatao. Job growth was not strong enough to curb the widespread unemployment. A government contract to build India's first indigenous car was awarded to Sanjay Gandhi, whose Maruti company subsequently failed to produce a single unit.

Related Topics:
Sanjay Gandhi - Maruti

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Indira had stood accused of authoritarianism before. Using her strong parliamentary majority, she had amended the Constitution and stripped power from the states granted under the federal system. The Congress Party government had repeatedly imposed President's Rule by deeming states ruled by opposition parties as "lawless and chaotic", thus winning administrative control of those states. Elected officials resented the growing influence of Sanjay Ghandi, who had become Indira's close political advisor at the expense of men like P.N. Haksar, the architect of Indira's political ascendancy. Renowned public figures and former freedom-fighters like Jaya Prakash Narayan and Acharya Jivatram Kripalani now spoke actively against her Government.

Related Topics:
Jaya Prakash Narayan - Acharya Jivatram Kripalani

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Opponents had long alleged that Indira's party fraudulently won the 1971 elections. In June 1975 the High Court of Allahabad found the sitting Prime Minister guilty of employing a government servant in her election campaign and Congress Party work. Technically, this constituted election fraud, and the court thus ordered her to be removed from her seat in Parliament and banned from running in elections for six years. Although Indira immediately appealed the decision, the opposition parties rallied en masse calling for her resignation. Strikes by unions, and protest rallies, paralyzed life in many states. J.P. Narayan's Janata coalition even called upon the military services to disobey orders and eject the PM from power. Public disenchantment combined with hard economic times and an unresponsive government. A huge rally surrounded the Parliament building and Indira's residence in Delhi, demanding her resignation.

Related Topics:
1975 - High Court - Janata

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After consultation with the USSR representative, KGB agent Leonid Shebarshin, Indira ordered President Fakhruddin Ali Ahmed to declare a state of emergency. This move was endorsed by Vinoba Bhave (who called it Anushasan Parva ), and also by Mother Teresa. Indira then called out the police and the Army to break up the strikes and protests, ordering the arrest of all opposition leaders. Many of these were men who had first gone to jail fighting the British in the 1930s and 1940s. Curfews, indiscriminate charges and unlimited powers of detention were granted to police, while all publications were directly censored by the Ministry for Information and Broadcasting. Elections were indefinitely postponed, and non-Congress state governments were dismissed. The Prime Minister pushed a series of increasingly harsh bills and constitutional amendments through parliament with little discussion or debate. Indira attempted to re-write the nation's laws to protect herself from legal prosecution once emergency rule was revoked. Still, Indira did not feel her powers were amassing quickly enough, so she utilized President Fakhruddin Ali Ahmed, an Indira loyalist, to issue "extraordinary laws" that bypassed parliament altogether, allowing her to rule by decree. Inder Kumar Gujral, future Prime Minister but then Indira's Minister for Information and Broadcasting, resigned protesting Sanjay Gandhi's interference in his Ministry's work.

Related Topics:
KGB - Leonid Shebarshin - Fakhruddin Ali Ahmed - State of emergency - Vinoba Bhave - Mother Teresa - Rule by decree - Inder Kumar Gujral

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Indira's emergency rule lasted nineteen months. During this time, in spite of the controversy involved, the country made significant economic and industrial progress. This was primarily due to the end of strikes in factories, colleges and universities, and the disciplining of trade union and student unions power. Production and government work become more efficient. Tax evasion was reduced by zealous government officials, although corruption was resilient. Agricultural and industrial production expanded considerably under Indira's 20-point Programme; revenues increased, and so did India's financial standing in the international community. Against this must be counted the arrest and torture of thousands of political activists, the ruthless clearing of slums around Delhi's Jama Masjid area ordered by Sanjay Gandhi which left hundreds of thousands of people homeless and thousands killed, and the family planning program which forcibly imposed vasectomy on thousands of fathers and was often maladministered, nurturing a public anger against family planning that persists into the 21st century.

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In 1977, greatly misjudging her own popularity, Indira called elections and was roundly defeated. To the surprise of some observers, she meekly agreed to step down, although the theory has been proposed that Field Marshall Sam Maneckshaw, Chief of Army Staff, threatened her by suggesting the possibility of forcible removal.

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:Detailed article: Indian Emergency

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