26 September 2024 : Daily Answer Writing

Q1) While the Emergency of 1975 was touted as seminal for national security and unity by some, the critics paint it as the darkest phase of Post Independent India. Discuss. What insights and lessons did emergency provide for the country?

ANS

Emergency under Article 352 of the constitution gives extraordinary power to the central government to tackle a crisis or a difficult situation. In 1975, emergency was imposed by Indira Gandhi’s government due to ‘internal disturbance’ in the country. The Emergency lasted for 21 months, during which many controversial steps were taken by the government.

Imposition of emergency was seminal for national security and unity because:

1. Frequent strikes paralyzed the government. Government was constantly in crisis management mode while regular governance and developmental function took a backseat. For example: Strike of Railway employees went for weeks.
2. J P Narayan led marches across the country against Indira Gandhi, which created a serious law and order situation in the country.
3. J P Narayan gave the call for Sampoorna Kranti, i.e. complete Revolution. He even went to the extent of asking the military to disobey the government’s orders.
4. Conflict between the Judiciary and the executive reached its peak. Many decisions taken by democratically elected government were reversed by judiciary.
5. All these obstacles hindered pro-poor policies of the government and ‘lawfully elected government was held hostage’.

However, the period of emergency was also a dark phase of Independent India because:

1. Many scholars argue that the emergency was imposed by Indira Gandhi not to save the country but to save the government which was losing out on the popular vote.
2. Government had sufficient ‘regular’ power to address law and order problem.
3. There was no credible information report that pointed towards any significant threat to India.
4. The provisions of emergency were used to suppress government critics. All the opposition leaders were put behind bars and every newspaper had to pass through the pre-censorship where anything critical of the government was censored.
5. The government in the name of development destroyed slums and carried out a forced mass sterilization program.

The Emergency brought out both the weaknesses and the strengths of India’s democracy. Following lessons were learned from the emergency of 1975:

1. Although many believed that India ceased to be democratic during the Emergency. However, in the 1977 elections congress was the first time defeated decisively. It was clear that the foundation of democracy in India is robust and it is not possible to do away with democracy in India.
2. It brought out some ambiguities in the Constitution that were rectified by the Morarji Desai government by the 44th CAA, 1978. The phrase ‘internal disturbance’ in Article 352 was replaced with ‘armed rebellion’ and it made it mandatory written advice by the cabinet to the President to proclaim an emergency.
3. The Emergency made everyone more aware of the value of civil liberties. Many civil liberties organizations like the People’s Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL) came up after this experience.
4. The Courts had also started taking an active role after the Emergency. This was a response to the inability of the judiciary to protect civil liberties during the emergency like in ADM Jabalpur v Shivkant Shukla.

Although, National emergency 1975 marks the darkest hour of Indian democracy, democratic culture in India had proved to be resilient as the Congress government lost the general election that acted as a referendum where the masses of the country rejected the anti-democratic regime. In this sense, the experience of 1975 -77 ended up strengthening the foundations of democracy in India.