FIFTY years ago, India’s democracy faltered as the then Prime Minister Mrs. Indira Gandhi, though severely restricted in her powers in Parliament, imposed State of Emergency on the country. What followed was a clear abrogation of countless legitimate and democratic rights of the citizens. Though Mrs. Indira Gandhi described that stage as a massive aberration, she nonetheless persisted with it for as long as nineteen months. During that period, the nation’s democracy suffered. The nation’s internal goodwill suffered.

 

The nation’s international reputation as a democratic polity suffered. But that dark phase also taught the Indian nation a lesson about how to preserve and protect democracy. The nation -- its people and its political community -- resolved never to allow such a state to occur again. Most fortunately, the Indian nation has kept its own word to itself for the past fifty years. There still might have been some minor aberrations all right, but the overall conduct of the Indian polity has been within the structure and spirit of democracy. Though the Indian polity still carries some scars of those 19 dark months, the lesson it learned has been of much greater importance than the ugly marks it has left behind. This is the most critical gain. True, countless lakhs suffered during those dirty days of Emergency slapped on the country on June 25, 1975 -- exactly fifty years ago. Countless lives were terribly and irreparably disturbed by arrests and disruptions of different kinds. Yet, thanks to its built-in resilience, the larger Indian society emerged from that unhappy experience and started rebuilding its morals and morale to a healthier condition.

 

The present day Indian polity is enjoying the fruits of that lesson learned and implemented with silent dedication. History has recorded that Mrs. Indira Gandhi slapped the Emergency on the Indian nation just because she wanted to perpetuate her political power. No matter those 19 months of the Emergency when Mrs. Gandhi and her coterie wielded unchecked power, history taught her the lesson that she never forgot. And remarkably, history also accorded her another opportunity to return to power just three years later -- signalling another bright chapter in India’s resilience as a democratic polity. There is no doubt that some elements also nursed a tendency to decry the Emergency politically. Despite that, the larger Indian society got over that dark memory and started building again its democratic credentials in the most credible manner. Any researcher in political science across the world, therefore, would give India full marks for its maturity to handle the situation capably and absorb the tectonic shocks and digest their ill-effects -- and move on. India has really moved on in the past fifty years. Its politics has matured. Its robust common sense and common faith in democracy has stayed unaltered through the past fifty years.

 

At this juncture fifty years later, there is only the need to recall how the larger society emerged from that shattering experience. This recall has a glorious golden edge, a terrific silver lining, and a clearly carved signature of its unshakable faith in democracy. No matter those few elements that behave contrary to this belief system, the larger Indian society has adopted democracy as a matter of Dharma and not just as a matter of physical or structural arrangement. In other words, for the Indian society, democracy is its spiritual core that will endure itself in any condition. As the nation’s memory darts back to that moment fifty years ago when the Emergency was clamped, its resolve, too, rises again to a great height to preserve the gift the Indian people have given to themselves by way of democracy. Nobody would call the Emergency a boon, but there is no doubt that it came as a sort of boon in bad disguise and taught us a hard lesson.