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An ominous sense of déjà vu

The Emergency marked a watershed in the history of independent India.

An ominous sense of déjà vu

Wavelength: The authors see a stark resemblance between Narendra Modi-Amit Shah and Indira Gandhi-Deb Kant Barooah teams. In fact, Shah enjoys a stronger position in the BJP than the Congress leader’s aide did Photo:PTI



Sandeep Sinha

The Emergency marked a watershed in the history of independent India. All the painstaking efforts that went into the making of the Constitution, embodying the highest democratic ideals, and the sacrifice of the freedom fighters, came to a naught with one swift stroke of the pen. What was more alarming was the Kafkaesque metamorphosis of a democratically elected leader, basking in the glory of the 1971 war, into an autocrat, surrounded by a coterie that tried to concentrate all power in its hands.

More than four decades after the Emergency was proclaimed in the country, on June 25, 1975, the authors John Dayal and Ajay Bose see a grim parallel to it in the conditions obtaining under the present dispensation, the trigger for the present edition of the book.

The authors see clear parallels between Indira Gandhi and Narendra Modi, both of whom they say, have reduced their cabinets to rubber stamps. While Indira Gandhi had Deb Kant Barooah as the party chief, known for his catchline ‘Indira is India’; Modi has a far more formidable companion in Amit Shah who keeps the party apparatus under check. The bureaucracy, like in the time of Indira Gandhi, is run by a select group of loyalist officers, and there is a tremendous similarity in the psyche of Indira Gandhi and Narendra Modi, with their disregard for constitutional niceties and liberal principles. The authors say that while Indira Gandhi did quite believe in Atal Behari Vajpayee’s description of her as Durga after the Bangladesh war, Narendra Modi has modelled himself on Narendra Dev or Swami Vivekananda, wearing turbans and crossing his arms on his chest and gazing into the distant future.

The Dalits and Muslims are again today the worst sufferers of the breakdown in law and order. The Turkman Gate incident was seen as an attempt by the Emergency administration, despite its secular ideology, to scatter the concentration of Muslim residents and businessmen around Jama Masjid in Delhi. Under the present government, the attempt has become more systematic, and there is an atmosphere of fear with the Intelligence Bureau and the National Investigation Agency working in an atmosphere of opaqueness. And in today’s undeclared Emergency, while no restrictions have outwardly been imposed on the media, the Fourth Estate is seen to have gagged itself voluntarily, turning into handmaidens and propaganda tools for the regime, barring some exceptions.

While Dayal and Bose are within their right to draw a parallel against what unbridled power can do to a democratically elected government with a huge majority, the fact remains that the work tends to sound only a note of caution. The way ‘notebandi’ was imposed, in a roughshod fashion, troubling the common man, was an example of the autocratic trend, but that democracy continues to thrive remains evident in the checks in the form of defeat of the BJP in Bihar and more recently in Karnataka where all parties came together to keep the saffron outfit out of power.

As eminent journalist Mark Tully points out in the foreword of the book, the danger appears because of an atmosphere of fear, of what a brute majority would entail, but the situation is not quite like the Emergency. The Constitution has not been suspended and the fundamental rights are still in place. But growing disappointment over “achche din” and discontent among the farming community are signs that the present government may have its speed governors in place. And that bodes well for India’s democracy.

That in India, illiteracy is different from ignorance was shown by the people when tired of the atrocities, they lost all fear and threw Indira Gandhi out of power. The book describes how at the Boat Club rally, the assorted crowd jeered at the Prime Minister and her cohorts, who were completely out of touch with reality, making clear the writing on the wall. In that lay the beauty of the Indian democracy, reflected in its resilience. Pushed to the wall, it bounces back.   

The book is a fascinating account of how things were in Delhi. It portrays how Sanjay Gandhi wielded power along with his acolytes like Rukhsana Sultana, how Delhi functioned under a bunch of officers led by Lieutenant Governor Kishan Chand, a former ICS officer, the tussle to develop Delhi between the DDA under its vice-chairman Jagmohan and BR Tamta, the MCD Commissioner. It also shows how the road to hell is paved with the best of intentions as nasbandi (sterilisation campaign) done forcibly but undertaken with the noblest of intentions to limit family size to improve their economic condition, went awry, because it was done under duress. The chapters on Turkman Gate demolition and the functioning of the Delhi Police under its IG Bhawanimal and DIG PS Bhinder, besides the bureaucratic maze, make for absorbing reading. Their sole concern was to earn the pleasure of Sanjay Gandhi. 

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