The word 'Emergency' has been thrown about so liberally by the current ruling regime, to corner the Congress party, that it has almost become just another piece of rhetoric. Then there is the counter charges from the opposition of 'undeclared emergency' by the Modi government. All of this makes emergency feel like something bad, but not so bad - like a little more of the godi media and some more exaggerated sycophancy than what we see today.
So it was quite a rude surprise to read about the reality of the Emergency that Indira Gandhi declared in 1975.
I guess all powerful people are paranoid about people plotting to take away their power. Indira Gandhi who had moulded the Congress party in her own image was no exception. By 1975 the conversion of Congress from the party that fought for the independence of the country to the party that was solely devoted to furthering the cause of the Nehru- Gandhi clan, was complete. Most stalwarts of the independence movement had left the party or had been kicked out. When the protest movement by JP in Bihar and others in the country gained momentum it was easy for Indira to convince herself that the country was moving towards anarchy and she had to act in the interest of the nation. The last straw was Indira's disqualification by an Allahabad court in a case bought about by the maverick socialist Raj Narain
The book suggests that the idea of an emergency was first suggested in a strategy note by the Indira acolyte and then Bengal chief minister Siddharth Shankar Ray. The Allahabad court ruling was the event that triggered its execution. It started with a bang with a very large number of opposition political leaders arrested and power supply cut to most significant national newspapers preventing them from publishing.
One of the hallmarks of Emergency was how severely media was muzzled by VC Shukla. Most large media houses promptly and enthusiastically fell in line. Foremost among those being TOI, Hindustan Times and The Hindu. LK Advani summed up their attitude to emergency as "When asked to bend, they crawled". Among several smaller publications one large media house that resisted was The Indian Express led by the formidable team of publisher Ramnath Goenka and editor Arun Shourie.
Another hallmark of Emergency was the rise, the patronage and the excesses committed by Sanjay Gandhi. It was clear to many like the Haryana chief minister Bansi Lal that the way to Indira's heart was through Sanjay and they left no stone unturned in pleasing him. Sanjay had the run of the country and power dynamic in the congress started shifting from Indira's people to Sanjay's people. The likes of Ambika Soni came to the fore.
One interesting thing that I learned from the book was how emergency ended. Indira was the daughter of Jawaharlal - a man feted by the global 'intelligentsia'. This adulation was inherited by Indra as well. The withdrawal of this affection and a virtual blacklisting by western friends was the one thing that disturbed Indira more than any of the excesses committed by Sanjay and his people.
The author has done a good job in bringing alive the atmosphere of the emergency. The book also provides us a backstory and context to several political leaders from 1990's to now. Author's own husband was arrested and mistreated during emergency so that would definitely have had some influence on her writing. The books seems like an essential reading in the understanding of post independence Indian history.
PS: Another book that covers this period and provides a more visceral and poignant view is Rohinton Mistry's A Fine Balance . That is one of the gem's of Indian writing in English and one of the only English books I have read that really delves in detail into the lives of India's poor and unfortunate (of course this could be function of my limited exposure) , For me A Fine balance , not everyone's cup of tea, was like an Indian Grapes of Wrath and one of my few 5.0/5.0 books.
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