Hindustan Times

Dhrubo Jyoti

Dipankar Ghose

Shastri's unexpected death heralds a change, a new country is born of a war on the border, and Emergency acts as a black mark on the national record.

Garibi Hatao, Bangladesh war, Emergency: 5 key moments

<h2 style="text-align:center;">Shastri dies</h2>

<p>One of the tallest leaders of the freedom movement, Lal Bahadur Shastri was among the senior-most ministers in the Jawaharlal Nehru cabinet. When Nehru died in 1964, Shastri easily commanded the most respect, and was backed by then Congress chief K Kamaraj and other members of the cabinet, who wanted to keep the far more conservative Morarji Desai away from the prime minister’s chair.</p><p>Shastri brought Indira Gandhi into the government by appointing her union minister for information and broadcasting, but she largely kept a low profile. His unexpected death in Tashkent in 1966, a day after signing a peace treaty, however, heralded the rise of Indira Gandhi on the national stage — a development that would change the course of Indian politics.</p><h2 style="text-align:center;">Rise of regional parties</h2>

<p>The 1967 elections were a watershed. For the first time since independence, the Congress saw its hegemony eroded, a result of the sluggish economy and numerous internecine conflicts. The party was ousted from power in nine states, and lost control of the crucial state of Uttar Pradesh a month after the elections, when Charan Singh defected from the party. A clutch of regional parties, as well as the Swatantra Party and the Jana Sangh, benefited from the Congress’s slide. And while the party bounced back in states such as Rajasthan and Gujarat, it never recovered its footing in states such as Tamil Nadu and West Bengal.</p><h2 style="text-align:center;">Garibi Hatao</h2>

<p>In 1967, the Congress narrowly won the general election and, soon after, suffered a split due to an intractable conflict between Indira Gandhi and the old guard, led by people such as then party chief K Kamaraj and senior leader Morarji Desai. In the 1971 election, Indira Gandhi opted for a populist, left-leaning campaign, symbolised by the slogan “Garibi Hatao, Desh Bachao (Eradicate Poverty, Save the Country)”, and campaigned on the basis of her new social platform (bolstered by the abolishing of the privy purses of erstwhile rulers of princely states just months before). The results were emphatically in her favour, and the Congress found a potent social mix that would keep the party in power for most of the next two decades.</p><h2 style="text-align:center;">Bangladesh war</h2>

<p>India’s decisive victory over Pakistan in the 1971 war that led to the creation of Bangladesh was a watershed moment in our young country’s history; one that reverberated around the world. It burnished Indira Gandhi’s stature in the country, and cemented her profile as a mass leader with a strong ground connect. It decimated her opponents within the party and the old guard of the Congress, who could not compete with the tremendous popularity that Gandhi gained in the aftermath of the war.</p><h2 style="text-align:center;">Emergency</h2>

<p>In some ways, the incredible popularity of Gandhi became her undoing. Mired in controversy, an adverse judicial ruling that disqualified her, and a growing opposition movement under the leadership of Jayaprakash Narayan, she decided to declare a national emergency in June 1975, suspending a large gamut of citizens’ rights and arresting opposition leaders in a brutal crackdown. This dark chapter in India’s democracy saw several excesses that were later widely condemned — such as forced sterilisations and peremptory slum clearances — that prompted anger across the country and galvanised the Opposition. The results of Gandhi’s excesses would be evident in the 1977 election, when the Congress was bundled out for the first time since independence.</p>