President Pranab Mukherjee explains why he could not support the movement against the Emergency

In this excerpt from Pranab Mukherjee’s new book The Dramatic Decade—the first volume of a trilogy—Mukherjee claims that Jayaprakash Narayan failed to see through the opportunism of the opposition parties demanding Indira Gandhi’s resignation in 1975.

The Allahabad High Court (on 13 June 1975) held Indira Gandhi to be guilty of malpractice during her 1971 electoral contest in Rae Bareli. While the court found her guilty on two technical grounds—taking assistance of government officers to construct rostrums and supply power for loudspeakers at two election rallies and taking the assistance of Yash Pal Kapoor, a government official, for furthering her election prospects—it acquitted her of the other charges. That is, she did not exceed the prescribed ceiling on election expense; did not bribe voters with gifts and free conveyance; her use of air-force aircraft and helicopters during the election was not corrupt practice; and the use of the cow and calf symbol did not amount to an exploitation of voters’ religious sentiments. This being the case, it became clear that Indira Gandhi’s election was declared void because of a legal technicality.

The day after the judgement, JP [Jayaprakash Narayan] thundered from Patna, ‘Mrs Gandhi’s failure to bow to the High Court verdict would not only be against the law as found by the Allahabad High Court, but against all public decency and democratic practice.’

On 25 June 1975, JP addressed a massive rally at Ramlila Maidan, Delhi, at which he announced a programme of civil disobedience. He repeated his exhortation to the police and the army to disobey ‘illegal’ orders, challenging Indira Gandhi to bring charges against him if she thought he was preaching treason. He asked students ‘to walk out of classrooms and walk into jails’. He suggested to the Chief Justice of India, A.N. Ray, that it would not be in his personal interest to sit on the division bench of the Supreme Court which would hear Indira Gandhi’s appeal, as he was obliged to the Prime Minister for his appointment.

JP’s histrionics clearly highlighted that the opposition’s sole aim was to get Indira Gandhi to resign—wanting her out even before the final decision of the Supreme Court. Restoration of the rule of law was then clearly not the issue, as it still prevailed in the country. The Prime Minister was entitled to continue in office and she did so according to the law of the land.

JP had contended that if a government was corrupt, people, through agitation, could demand its resignation. While I do not debate that point, my contention is that such charges of corruption must be factually substantiated rather than be based on supposition. Not a single charge of corruption was established against those whom the opposition implicated as corrupt. Not even the scores of commissions set up during the Janata regime could establish these charges. If the opposition’s allegations were based on facts, would this be the case?

Second, which democracy in the world would permit a change of a popularly and freely elected government through means other than a popular election? Can parties beaten at the hustings replace a popularly elected government by sheer agitation? Was it not prudent for those who were determined to change the government to wait till the elections which were but round the corner? Does the rule of law mean that the remedies available to the common man are to be denied to someone holding an elected office? Why did the opposition want Indira Gandhi to resign even before the appeal was heard by the Supreme Court? Is it not a fact that the Supreme Court permitted Indira Gandhi to continue as Prime Minister against a conditional stay? How could anybody replace her when the overwhelming majority of Congress MPs—with a two-thirds majority in the Lok Sabha—resolved that Indira Gandhi should continue as the party’s leader in Parliament and thereby as the Prime Minister of India? How does the issue of morality at all arise when allegations causing Indira Gandhi to lose the Allahabad High Court election suit were of a technical nature and no charges of moral turpitude could be established against her?

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A closer analysis of the situation provides the answer. Without a doubt, JP was spearheading the strategy of the opposition. The fact that opposition parties accepted his leadership and joined his total revocation movement had little to do with ideological conviction. With no one among them to measure up to Indira Gandhi’s political charisma, they needed a moral authority to provide them strength. And who better than JP to do this at the time? Without JP, this movement would not have been so powerful; it would not have attained the dimension it did without JP, evident in the tremendous popular response it received even before the Emergency was declared. The fact that the Congress was defeated in the Gujarat assembly elections in 1975 was mainly on account of this movement.

I did not know JP. I met him only once in 1974 at the Gandhi Peace Foundation along with C.M. Stephen. Krishna Kant had organized this meeting. We talked about the Naxalite movement, and I was impressed by his personality and his genuine approach to this emotional and sensitive issue. I found him to be far above petty political games; he truly wanted to restore moral values in Indian politics and hence expected everyone, including those in the ruling party, to follow his advice. I have reason to believe that he was more than justified in having such expectations. He was a rare Indian politician who didn’t clamour for office or power in spite of having it within his reach; he was a man who could have succeeded Nehru as the second most popular man on the Indian political stage. How could such a man not see through the opportunism of the opposition parties?

However, rationally speaking, I could not support the movement. To me it appeared to be directionless. It was contradictory in that it was a movement fighting against corruption yet composed of people and parties whose integrity was not above board. Not only personalities, but organizations too joined the movement to further their own interests. The opposition parties were no exception.

Extracted from The Dramatic Decade: The Indira Gandhi Years. Reproduced with the permission of Rupa Publications.