Miss Conduct S02 E13: Indira Gandhi

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GUEST ON BOARD: This week, we are joined by Priya Mirza, who teaches political science at Zakir Husain Delhi College. Priya is the host of The Longest Constitution podcast, which looks at how the vision of the Constitution and how it affects everyday life!

In this episode, we talk about Mrs. Indira Gandhi’s stint as Prime Minister from 1971 to 1977, during which she was convicted of election malpractice and was also responsible for submerging the country into a 2-year long national Emergency – resulting in the suppression of fundamental rights, elections, freedom of the press, jailing of her naysayers, and all forms of democratic expression and demonstration. 

In 1971, general elections were held across India for Parliamentary seats to the Lok Sabha (or the lower house of the Parliament). In the constituency of Rae Baraeli, Indira Gandhi stood for and subsequently won the Lok Sabha seat. She was the incumbent constituent representative, and also the incumbent Prime Minister, having won two other general elections before this. She won with a total of 66.35% of the total votes. Her opponent, Mr. Raj Narain, of the Samyukta Socialist Party, only got 25.88% of the votes. As the leader of the party with the most seats, Mrs. Gandhi went on to become Prime Minister again. 

Raj Narain was a well-known and vocal critic of Mrs. Gandhi’s policies and policies. So it was no surprise that a few short days after her re-election, he filed an election petition against her, accusing her of malpractice under Section 123 of the Representation of Peoples Act, 1951. 

On 12th June 1975, the Allahabad High Court concurred with the accusations, and proceeded to set aside Mrs Gandhi’s election. 

Mrs Gandhi was removed from her Parliamentary seat. Additionally, she was disqualified from holding any Lok Sabha seats for the next 6 years. 

And when she was told this, literally a day later, Mrs Gandhi imposed a national Emergency that would last well into 1977. 

This saw nation-wide protests and, eventually, led to the Janata Party’s rise in Indian politics. Raj Narain too was arrested on the same day, along with many opposition leaders such as Morarji Desai, Jai Prakash Narayan, LK Advani, Atal Bihari Vajpayee, and Charan Singh. 

There is also a major constitutional angle to all this – Mrs. Gandhi govt passed the 39th amendment to the Constitution right after this incident. This amendment basically said that no court can take up the matter of the election of the Prime Minister. This measure was to ensure that no court, including the Supreme Court of India, could interfere if the election of the Prime Minister was suspect. This was just one of many steps that Mrs Gandhi would take to make sure that her position as Prime Minister would not be questioned by anyone. However, this matter was taken up by the Supreme Court at the insistence of Raj Narain, again. And the Supreme Court effectively struck down the 39th amendment, as a gross violation of the democratic principles of the country and of the Basic Structure of the Constitution.

And thus Mrs Gandhi’s reign would temporarily end. In 1977, after the Emergency was lifted, the opposition political faction formed a coalition of parties called the Janata Party, which inflicted the Indian National Congress' first electoral defeat since Indian independence. So you can comfortably say that Mrs Gandhi’s actions between 1971 to 1977 effectively brought down her government. 

And that’s what this episode is about! More specifically, the allegations around the electoral malpractice, what the Allahabad High Court said when she was “unseated” from public office, and what happened to Mrs Gandhi after the Emergency. 


SOURCES FOR THE EPISODE: 

 

Indira Gandhi - the early years and career

 

Before the various courts:

 

The 39th Amendment to the Constitution:

 

Raj Narain, the Emergency and beyond: