Shripad Amrit Dange - The CPI and The Emergency

The CPI and The Emergency

A state of emergency declared by Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, in June 1975, by invoking Article 352 of the Constitution of India, and it lasted for 21 months. Emergency provisions suspended all the Constitutional rights and gave power to rule by decree. It enabled the Prime Minister to suspend elections and civil liberties.

Indira Gandhi took this extreme step due to a host of reasons. The venerated Gandhian leader Jaya Prakash Narayan's agitation in Bihar for change in provincial government, was getting increasingly against the Central Government. More immediate reason for clamping of emergency was that in a judgment dated 12 June 1975, Justice Jagmohanlal Sinha of the Allahabad High Court held that Mrs. Gandhi was guilty on the charge of misuse of government machinery for her election campaign. The case was filed by Raj Narain, who had been recently defeated in the parliamentary election by Indira Gandhi. The court declared her election null and void and unseated her from her seat in Lok Sabha. The court also banned her from contesting any election for an additional six years.