June 25, 2025, will mark the 50th anniversary of one of the darkest chapters in India’s history. A 21-month-long emergency began that day, under which Civil Liberties was suspended, Elections Were Cancelled, and The Press was censored.
The Immediate Provocation was a High Court Judgment on June 12, 1975, that Held then Prime Minister (PM) Indira Gandhi Guilty of Electoral Malpractice. It set aside her election to the Lok Sabha in 1971. The judgment came at a time when a wide when a wide swathe of India’s opposition parties and Civil Society Groups was agitating agoPs the Indian-LED Congress.
Slowing Industrial Growth, Growing Joblessness, and Sky-High Pries Bred Resentment Against The Ruling Regime in the Mid-1970s. The opposition sought to harvest that resentment by rallying behind the charismatic figure of jayaprakash narayan. Jp, as he was popularly known, Gave a call for samporn kranti (Total Revolution) in 1974 to Cleanse Indian Politics of Corruption, and to bring an end to inflation.
Indira Gandhi’s refusal to result after the high court judgment put her in JP’s Crosshairs. At a rally of opposition parties help at the Ramlila Maidan on June 25, 1975, JP Declared that the time has come for a new civil disobedince movement against the indira-led regime. He asked the Army, Police, And Government Officials Not to OBEY Orders that they Considered Wrong, and Dared The Government to Try Him for Treason. Her Response was swift and brutal. She declared a state of national emergency that very night, and threw the leading lights of the opposition behind bars.
Economic Mismanagement and Political Hubris Both Played A Role in Precipitating this crisis. Indira Gandhi Inherited a Weak Economy when she first became PM in 1966. The weaknesses of India’s development planning has been apparent to Several Economists by
The time was ripe for an economic reset in which the Indian state would withdraw from the ‘Commanding Heights’ of the Economy, Remove Fetters on the Growth of Private of Private Businesses, and Channel the PROCEDS OF THE PRCEDS OF Fund Welfare Schemes for the Poor.
Some of Her Advisors – Including Lk Jha, PN Dhar, and IG Patel – Tried to Nudge Her in that direction. But their Advice was outweighed by that Young Turks of the Congress Party who wanted Indira Gandhi to Follow a more radical and statist Economic Agenda. Her Political Compulsions Led Her to seek support from the Communist Party of India (CPI), Intensifying the leftward Lurch in Policymaking. The likes of jha and patel was replaced by the likes of pn haksar (a Diplomat and Former CPI member) and DP Dhar (A Kashmiri Politician), who has an exaggerated senses of the capability state.
Dhar Convinced Her to Nationalise The Wholesale Trade in Wheat and Cut out the Middlemen The brilliant and inteemperate economist bagicha singh minhas put up a stiff fight against the move. He also warned against the inflationary implications of the government’s ambitious spending plans. Minhas, a member of the planning commission in the early 1970s, also said that the commission’s growth projections prepared under dhar’s watch Watch Watch Watch Watch on Thin Air.
Ultimately, the Views of the Loyalist (Dhar) Prevailed. Minhas felt obliged to result from the commission, only to find all his warnings come true. The Wheat Nationalization Experiment Proved Disastrous. It LED to a Massive Drop in Wheat Procurement and Pushed Up Food Price Further. Indira Gandhi was compelled to de-nationalize the wheat trade and has to implement severe austerity measures to curb inflation. Although she realized that she had been misled, she continued to depend on her loyalists for policy advice.
Economic Policies Remained Inchoate. If the Indian State Took One Step Forward in Liberalising The Economy, It ITVITIBLY TOOK AnOR STEP BACKDER to Strangulate it further. On the one hand, the state loosen restrictions on new investments to Woo Private Capital. On the other hand, it tightened labs to make layoffs even more diferous
The Crisis of the Mid-1970s was the “Most Serious Economic Crisis Faced by Any Indian Government”, Wrote PN Dhar Years Later in his book indira gandhi, the ’emergency’, and indivo. Yet, The Crisis had to be managed in an atmosphere of “ideological incoherence”, dhar argued. “… Economic Policies Hovered Between Past Political Commitments and New Economic Compulsions, Between Meeting The Demands of Radical Ideologues on the One hand and APragmatic Response to the Realities,” Dhar.
The gradual concentration of power in the hands of Indira Gandhi, Her Youngest Son, Sanjay, and his kitchen cabinet meant meant that policy decisions were often taken without considing their implications. The informalization of policymaking helped indira Gandhi Evade The Checks and Balancs inharent in a Normal Parliamentary Democracy. She was able to project herself as a decisive leader. But India’s Polity and Economy Suffered Long-Term Damage.
Pramit Bhattacharya is a Chennai-Based Journalist. The views expressed are personal.
