The apologists for the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) never fail to remind people about the atrocities committed during 21 months of Emergency imposed by Indira Gandhi on June 25, 1975, that is 13 days after the Allahabad high court judgement disqualifying her election to parliament in 1971. Of late, while defending Chief Election Commissioner (CEC), Gyanesh Kumar Gupta, they as a diversionary tactic are working overtime in this direction. But what they overlook is the fact that though the then prime minister misused various government institutions and brutally suppressed the opposing voices, she did not influence the Election Commission during 1977 parliamentary election which took place when Emergency was still on. It is also an undeniable fact that notwithstanding arm-twisting of judiciary, the court was relatively more firm, assertive and active during her 16-year-long rule than since 2014. Not only the Congress party was swept out of power in 1977, she and her younger son, Sanjay Gandhi, lost from their respective Lok Sabha seats of Rae Bareli and Amethi. After the defeat she gracefully accepted the people’s verdict and handed over the power to the Janata Party. Ten months later on January 24, 1978, in a rally in Maharashtra, Indira Gandhi publicly apologised for all the excesses committed during the Emergency though she justified her decision to impose it as it was necessary for national security.True, Indira Gandhi made the announcement of election and easing (not lifting it completely of Emergency) in a radio broadcast on the intervening night of January 18-19 thinking that she would win it as the opposition was a divided house. She also thought that since inflation has been controlled, crackdown carried out against hoarders and trains and other services are running on time – all these measures – would yield a positive result. George Fernandes addressing the All India Railway Employees’ Rally at Beat Club, in New Delhi, on May 7, 1979. Phot: Facebook/R M Eco.But the whole move backfired. Barring George Fernandes, who was arrested in Baroda Dynamite Conspiracy Case, almost all the top leaders of the opposition were released. They closed their ranks and merged to form Janata Party. She was taken by complete surprise when the senior-most minister in her cabinet, Jagjivan Ram, and another colleague Hemvati Nandan Bahuguna, and several other Congressmen resigned and crossed over to the opposition camp. The public sentiment, especially in North India, took a U-turn leading to the rout of Congress. By March 21, 1977 everything was over. She lost the election and immediately resigned and Emergency was lifted. On March 24, 1977 India had a new Prime Minister Morarji Desai, something unthinkable till a couple of months back.Dispassionate study neededAs the leaders of the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) never miss any opportunity to drag the name of Indira Gandhi, the need of the hour is to objectively analyse what had happened on the run up to Emergency. The ongoing upsurge among youths across large part of India prompts one to ask how different the current situation is from the historic pre-Emergency students’ movement which actually started in Gujarat after the hike in college and hostel fees (which included the mess charge) in December 1973, that is just two months after the first ‘oil shock’ following the 17-day long Arab-Israel War in October the same year. The imposition of Emergency, gagging of press and arrest of opposition leaders were indefensible act, yet the apologetic Congress leaders could have explained the grave economic challenges India faced due to the global developments and devastating natural calamities.The whole issue should be seen in proper perspective. India had to fight three wars between 1962 and 1971, which caused huge strain on the country’s economy. Apart from this, different regions of India were plagued by natural calamities, famine in 1966-67 leading to the death of 2,353 people, half of them in Bihar, which then included present-day Jharkhand too. The unofficial toll was higher. India, like many other countries of the world had been passing through serious economic crisis as the oil price jumped four times in six months – from $three per barrel to $12 per barrel from October 1973 to March 1974.Also read: Politics | Why Modi’s Politics is Facing a Crisis of MoralityIndia had a bad monsoon in 1973. The de-linking of dollar from gold in August 1971, called Nixon Shock, started having its impact on economies all over the world. Thus, the task before the government was much more challenging than now.Due to sharp inflation, the country was marred by strikes by various trade unions, the biggest was by 17 lakh railway employees between May 8 and 27, 1974 which completely paralysed whole of India. There was a field day for hoarders and profiteers. Curiously, it was during this period that India on May 18, 1974 made its first nuclear test – the real good news for the country after the December 16, 1971 victory over Pakistan and liberation of Bangladesh.A year after the movement against the government spread thick and fast across India following the entry of Jayaprakash Narayan in the scene on June 5, 1974 at a huge rally in Patna, where he gave a call of Total Revolution, a single-member bench of Justice Jagmohan Lal Sinha of Allahabad high court on June 12, 1975 disqualified Prime Minister Indira Gandhi’s 1971 election from Rae Bareli parliamentary seat and barred her from holding any elected post for six years as she, according to the ruling, misused state machinery and government servants to win the seat. This was something very surprising by today’s standard when perhaps even the full bench of Supreme Court may think twice before cancelling the election of any MP of the ruling party on this ground – not to speak of prime minister by a single-member bench of any high court. The Supreme Court. Photo: www.facebook.com/SupremeCourtOfIndia.True, Indira Gandhi on November 7 of the same year got the Supreme Court ruling in her favour which overturned the Allahabad high court judgement. What is conveniently ignored by the BJP and its allies is the fact that the five-member bench which unanimously gave its verdict included Justice H.R. Khanna. The latter is still applauded for his judicial integrity as several months later on April 28, 1976 he was the lone dissenting judge in the Jabalpur ADM case. The apex court by 4-1 upheld the suspension of fundamental rights during Emergency. An upset Indira Gandhi in January 1977 superseded him at the time of appointment of the chief justice. Justice Khanna resigned in protest. Another significant aspect which is grossly overlooked is the fact that at the height of Emergency, the Supreme Court on November 7 at the same time struck down the 39th Constitutional Amendment (made in August 1975) which prevented the Supreme Court and high courts from taking up case related to the election of the prime minister, president, vice president and speaker of Lok Sabha. The Kesavananda Bharati versus State of Kerala was another landmark judgement, though it came before Emergency, that is on April 24, 1973. A 13-member bench in its 7-6 majority ruled that the basic structure of constitution can not be altered while making amendment.Earlier, in the February 27, 1967 Golaknath case delivered a year after Indira Gandhi became prime minister, the Supreme Court by 6-5 ruled that the parliament can not curtail or amend the Fundamental Rights enshrined in the Indian constitution.These independent rulings made during the tenure of Indira Gandhi should be taken into account while comparing the role of judiciary in the last 12 years. At the same time, here it can be argued that if she did not rig the 1977 election held during Emergency it is doubtful whether she had really indulged in mass scale malpractice against opposition candidate, Raj Narain, to win from Rae Bareli in 1971 when her popularity graph was quite high. Not only that, on June 12, 1975 – incidentally the date coincided with the ruling of Allahabad high court – opposition Janata Morcha, a precursor of the Janata Party, came to power in Gujarat. No electoral fraud was done to prevent the victory of opposition there. Different nature of protestIncidentally, the recent spate of agitations against the government also followed a war in West Asia in which oil price jumped by 60 to 80%, but not by 400% as in 1973-74. But it has less to do with the economic factor and more to do with the repeated leakages of papers in competitive examinations and against the CEC. Unlike 50-60 years ago, India is not plagued by any major famine. Nor it has faced global economic meltdown in the recent years as than. India became food grains surplus country and exporter in 1990s.If there is restiveness among the youths today it is because of chaos in educational set-up. The country is in the grip of policy paralysis. There is no excuse for millions of vacant posts. If there was food scarcity five or six decades back it was understandable as India was – like many other countries having history of exploitative colonial rule – technologically not as equipped as now to fight famine caused due to droughts and floods, a regular phenomenon then. New Delhi: INDIA bloc members and supporters during a “March for Democracy” to the Supreme Court against Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Gyanesh Kumar, in New Delhi, Monday, October 12, 2026. Photo: PTI/Rushikesh More.In contrast, if the price of essential items is rising today it is largely because of the mismanagement of the government. These challenges, many of them self-created, could have been solved without much difficulty. If unemployment is rampant, daily wages of labours have not risen in last one decade and job opportunities are shrinking, the government can not blame anyone else.Also read: Sowing Hope Under a State of Siege: Illustrations From Delhi’s October ProtestThe mess has been created because of the inefficiency of the government machinery. Hasty decisions made for public consumption, for example, imposition of lockdown on four hours notice on March 24, 2020 without any proper arrangement, took a heavy socio-economic toll. The party in power knows that by invoking religious slogans it is going to be voted back to power. When the global economic scenario was quite favourable and oil price crashed to $30 per barrel in January 2016, from $147 per barrel during the Manmohan Singh government in 2008, the Narendra Modi government on November 8, 2016 demonetised 86% of its currencies.The Modi government squandered this opportunity. Demonetisation was followed by what is alleged as the shoddy implementation of GST on July 1, 2017. Yet people did not protest – in fact many of them welcomed note ban and new tax measures. It was only after repeated malpractices in competitive examinations to be followed by charges of loot in Ayodhya temple fund from within the Sangh Parivar that youths felt that enough is enough. Now they have decided to take to streets once again seeking the resignation of CEC Gyanesh Kumar. Union education minister Dharmendra Pradhan’s ouster has emboldened them. So, if the disintegrated opposition exploited the unrest in mid-1970s and joined hands to oust Indira Gandhi, today the Congress and its allies are taking advantage of the situation. But Congress leader Rahul Gandhi has at least not given the call to the army and police to ignore the unconstitutional and immoral order of the government as Lok Nayak Jayaprakash Narayan did while addressing a massive opposition rally in Delhi’s Ram Lila Maidan on June 25, 1975. Panicked by this huge turnout Indira Gandhi imposed Emergency late on the same night.Soroor Ahmed is an independent journalist based in Bihar.