Rise of Indira Gandhi Between 1967 and 1971, Prime Minister
Indira Gandhi came to obtain near-absolute control over the government and the
Indian National Congress party, as well as a huge majority in Parliament. The first was achieved by concentrating the central government's power within the
Prime Minister's Secretariat, rather than the
Cabinet, whose elected members she saw as a threat and distrusted. For this, she relied on her principal secretary,
P. N. Haksar, a central figure in Indira's inner circle of advisors. Further, Haksar promoted the idea of a "committed bureaucracy" that required hitherto-impartial government officials to be "committed" to the ideology of the Congress. Within the Congress, Indira outmaneuvered her rivals, forcing the party to split in 1969—into the
Congress (O) (comprising the old-guard known as the "Syndicate") and her
Congress (R). A majority of the
All-India Congress Committee and Congress MPs sided with the prime minister. Indira's party was of a different breed from the Congress of old, which had been a robust institution with traditions of internal democracy. In the Congress (R), on the other hand, members quickly realised that their progress within the ranks depended solely on their loyalty to Indira Gandhi and
her family, and ostentatious displays of
sycophancy became routine. In the coming years, Indira's influence was such that she could install hand-picked loyalists as chief ministers of states, rather than their being elected by the Congress legislative party. Indira's ascent was backed by her charismatic appeal among the masses that was aided by her government's near-radical leftward turns. These included the July 1969
nationalisation of several major banks and the September 1970 abolition of the
privy purse; these changes were often done suddenly, via
ordinance, to the shock of her opponents. She had strong support in the disadvantaged sections—the poor,
Dalits, women and minorities. Indira was seen as "standing for socialism in economics and secularism in matters of religion, as being pro-poor and for the development of the nation as a whole." In the
1971 general elections, the people rallied behind Indira's populist slogan of
Garibi Hatao! (Abolish poverty!) to award her a huge majority (352 seats out of 518). "By the margin of its victory," historian
Ramachandra Guha later wrote, Congress (R) came to be known as the real Congress, "requiring no qualifying suffix."
Increasing government control of the judiciary on a 2001 stamp of India. He is remembered for leading the mid-1970s opposition against Prime Minister
Indira Gandhi and the Indian Emergency, for whose overthrow he had called for a "
total revolution". In 1967's
Golaknath case, the
Supreme Court said that the
Constitution could not be amended by
Parliament if the changes affect basic issues such as fundamental rights. To nullify this judgement, Parliament, dominated by the Gandhi-led Congress, passed the
24th Amendment in 1971. Similarly, after the government lost a Supreme Court case for withdrawing the
privy purse given to erstwhile princes, Parliament passed the 26th Amendment. This gave constitutional validity to the government's abolition of the privy purse and nullified the Supreme Court's order. This judiciary–executive battle would continue in the landmark
Kesavananda Bharati Case, where the 24th Amendment was called into question. With a wafer-thin majority of 7 to 6, the bench of the Supreme Court restricted Parliament's
amendment power by stating it could not be used to alter the "
basic structure" of the Constitution. Subsequently, Prime Minister Gandhi made
A. N. Ray—the senior-most judge amongst those in the minority in
Kesavananda Bharati—
Chief Justice of India. Ray superseded three judges more senior to him—
J. M. Shelat,
K. S. Hegde and Grover—all members of the majority in
Kesavananda Bharati. Indira Gandhi's tendency to control the judiciary met with severe criticism, both from the press and political opponents such as
Jayaprakash Narayan ("JP").
Political unrest This led some Congress party leaders to demand a move towards a
presidential system emergency declaration with a more powerful directly elected executive. The most significant of the initial such movement was the
Nav Nirman movement in Gujarat, between December 1973 and March 1974. Student unrest against the state's education minister ultimately forced the central government to dissolve the state legislature, leading to the resignation of the chief minister,
Rakshit Gautam, and the imposition of
President's rule. Meanwhile, there were assassination attempts on public leaders as well as the assassination of the Railway Minister
Lalit Narayan Mishra by a bomb. All of these indicated a growing law and order problem in the entire country, which Gandhi's advisors warned her of for months. In March–April 1974, a student agitation by the Bihar Chatra Sangharsh Samiti received the support of
Gandhian socialist
Jayaprakash Narayan, referred to as
JP, against the Bihar government. In April 1974, in Patna, JP called for "total revolution," asking students, peasants, and
labour unions to non-violently transform Indian society. He also demanded the dissolution of the state government, but this was not accepted by the center. A month later, the railway-employees union, the largest union in the country, went on a nationwide
railways strike. This strike was led by the firebrand trade union leader
George Fernandes who was the President of the All India Railwaymen's Federation. He was also the President of the Socialist Party. The strike was brutally suppressed by the Indira Gandhi government, which arrested thousands of employees and drove their families out of their quarters. In his speech, Narayan announced his decision to form "Lok Sangarsh Samiti" committee with
Morarji Desai as its head and
Nanaji Deshmukh as its secretary. The committee aimed to surround the Prime Minister's house and refuse anybody's entry in order to paralyze the functioning of government. The committee further asked people to obstruct the railway lines so that the trains could not move and to prevent the functioning of courts and government offices.
Raj Narain verdict Raj Narain, who had been defeated in the 1971 parliamentary election by Indira Gandhi, lodged cases of election fraud and use of state machinery for election purposes against her in the
Allahabad High Court.
Shanti Bhushan fought the case for Narain (
Nani Palkhivala fought the case for Gandhi). Indira Gandhi was also cross-examined in the High Court, which was the first such instance for an Indian Prime Minister (Indira Gandhi had to present herself for 5 hours in front of the judge). On 12 June 1975, Justice
Jagmohanlal Sinha of the Allahabad High Court found the prime minister guilty on the charge of misuse of government machinery for her election campaign. The court declared her election
null and void and unseated her from her seat in the
Lok Sabha. The court also banned her from contesting any election for an additional six years. Serious charges such as bribing voters and election malpractices were dropped and she was held responsible for misusing government machinery and found guilty on charges such as using the state police to build a dais, availing herself of the services of a government officer,
Yashpal Kapoor, during the elections before he had resigned from his position, and use of electricity from the state electricity department. Her supporters organized mass pro-Indira demonstrations in the streets of Delhi close to the Prime Minister's residence. Indira Gandhi challenged the High Court's decision in the Supreme Court. Justice
V. R. Krishna Iyer, on 24 June 1975, upheld the High Court judgment and ordered all privileges Gandhi received as an MP be stopped, and that she be debarred from voting. However, she was allowed to continue as Prime Minister pending the resolution of her appeal.
Jayaprakash Narayan and
Morarji Desai called for daily anti-government protests. The next day, Jayaprakash Narayan organized a large rally in Delhi, where he said that a police officer must reject the orders of the government if the order is immoral and unethical as this was
Mahatma Gandhi's motto during the freedom struggle. Such a statement was taken as a sign of inciting rebellion in the country. Later that day, Indira Gandhi requested a compliant President
Fakhruddin Ali Ahmed to proclaim a
state of emergency. Within three hours, the electricity to all major newspapers was cut and the political opposition was arrested. The proposal was sent without discussion with the Union Cabinet, who only learned of it and ratified it the next morning.
Preventive detention laws Before the emergency, the Indira Gandhi government passed draconian laws that would be used to arrest political opponents before and during the emergency. One of these was the
Maintenance of Internal Security Act (MISA), 1971, which was passed in May 1971 despite criticism from prominent opposition figures across partisan lines such as CPI(M)'s
Jyotirmoy Basu, Jana Sangh's
Atal Bihari Vajpayee, and the Anglo-Indian nominated MP
Frank Anthony. The Indira government also renewed the
Defence of India rules, which was withdrawn in 1967. Defence of India rules were given an expanded mandate 5 days into the emergency and renamed as Defence and Internal Security of India Rules. Another law,
Conservation of Foreign Exchange and Prevention of Smuggling Activities Act passed in December 1974, was also frequently used to target political opponents. ==Proclamation of the Emergency==