Introduction

The 6th Lok Sabha election that took place in the year 1977, being one of the most important
elections, is written in golden pages in the history of Independent India. Having said that,
what exactly was its importance in the democracy of India?

 “In this election, an attempt to justify the authoritarian rule carried out by Indira
Gandhi for 18 months during National Emergency through democratic elections was
outrightly rejected by those who had the franchise to vote.”
 This election gave India its first non- congress Prime Minister, therefore the
hegemony of Indian National congress at the centre level finally ended.
 The true principles of Democracy were restored post this election.
 The fundamental and civil rights were brought back.
 The independence of judiciary which had been snatched during emergency was
ensured.
 The role of media as the fourth pillar of democracy was strengthened.

Before discussing the afore-mentioned points in detail, let me briefly give a picture of the
period of emergency and the elections of 1977 that followed it.

Emergency

On 25 June 1975, in the midnight, the government declared that there was a threat of internal
disturbances and therefore, it invoked Article 352 of the Constitution .1 Electricity to all
newspaper publishing sites was cut down and not after dawn Jayprakash Narayan along with
several other opposition leaders was arrested.
Now what led to the imposition of emergency?

1.) Movement in Gujarat and Bihar with the latter leading to JP movement –

The country since 1971 after India- Pakistan war was going through economic crisis; the war
led to influx of 80 lakh Bangladeshis in India with the govt having to provide for them; crops
had failed in 1973-74 due to monsoonal disbalance; the price of oil had increased; the said
reasons led to high inflation rate causing wide unrest among Indians.

This unrest gave rise to two popular movements by students based on the same premise of
price rise in essential commodities like food, and corruption. These were the Gujarat and
1
SHVETA UPPAL, POLITICS IN INDIA SINCE INDEPENDENCE 108 (Ncert, 1st ed. 2014).
Bihar movements, the Gujarat movement culminated with re-election happening there in june
1975 resulting in massive defeat of the congress; the movement in Bihar however took
another direction, the students after a point of time invited Jayaprakash Narayan to lead them
and JP agreed with a demand that they would not limit the movement to the state but make it
national. He called for total revolution and after the Allahabad HC judgment asked Indira
Govt to step down, he decided to organise a national rally at Ramlilla maidan in Delhi. This
movement unsettled Indira Gandhi to a great extent.

2.) The Allahabad HC judgment rendering Indira Gandhi’s election invalid

Raj Narain, a socialist who contested against Indira Gandhi in 1971 elections, filed an
election petition against her claiming malpractice in election campaign of hers. Upon this
Plea, the Allahabad HC on 12th June, ruled in favour of Raj Narain and declared Gandhi’s
election as an MP from Raibareilley invalid and barred her from taking part in elections for 6
years. The court ordered Congress (R), the contemporary ruling party, to replace Gandhi in
her official posts in twenty days.2

The above-mentioned reasons provoked Indira Gandhi to issue the state of emergency, right
at night of the day when JP held a rally at Ramlila Maidan demanding her resignation. The
government under article 352 had the power to impose national emergency on the grounds of
external threat and internal disturbances3; Indira Gandhi regime used the latter provision to
impose emergency. The consequences of this state of authoritarian rule were-

 The rights of press were limited, everything before its publication had to be approved
by the govt, no information showing the govt in a bad picture was allowed to be
published. This was Press censorship. Those who wrote against emergency or the
government were detained.
 The provisions of Preventive Detention mentioned under Maintenance of Internal
Security Act, 1971, and DRA were made wide use of to arrest the opposition leaders
and other protestors. As per these provisions, the govt had the power to put someone
on indefinite detention merely on the apprehension that some offence would be
committed by them. According to the analysis of Shah Commission, the commission

2
SHVETA UPPAL, POLITICS IN INDIA SINCE INDEPENDENCE 108 (Ncert, 1st ed. 2014).
3
INDIA CONST. art.352, cl.1.
 constituted to study the aftermath of emergency, under the laws of Preventive
detention, nearly one lakh people were arrested.4
 Strikes, protest, rallies or any form of public agitation were banned. People were
rendered voiceless.5
 All the fundamental rights, including the right to approach the court upon violation of
some fundamental rights were suspended, rendering the citizens of India powerless.
 Independence of judiciary was compromised with, when in 1973, the government set
made Justice A.N Ray the chirf justice of india ignoring the seniority of three judges,
these three judges who were superseded by Ray, happened to be the ones who had
given rulings against the government. A.N Ray remained the chief justice till January
1977 and during this time all the orders of the Govt that were challenged in the SC
were approved, for example, the arrested persons were not even told of the reason
behind their arrests, and they could not even file the writ of habeas corpus. Many
cases were filed seeking redemption of this writ, many high courts gave the ruling that
habeas corpus cannot be suspended however the SC in 1976 overruled the HCs’
rulings and supported government’s stand.6
Moreover, by introducing the 42nd constitutional amendment act in 1976, the govt
gave the parliament an unrestrained power to amend all parts of the constitution and
took away the provision of judicial review, thus in a way going against keshavananda
bharti case. This provision made judiciary, the guardian of the constitution, weak.
The 39th CAA inserted a new article 329A so as to prevent the election of the
President, Prime Minister and Vice- President from being challenged in the court thus
rendering Raj Narain case ineffective.7
42nd CAA through its scores of provisions striped off some really important powers of
the SC, thus taking a step towards a regime with parliamentary supremacy.
 Sanjay Gandhi, son of Indira Gandhi carried out forced mass strerilisation of men as
young as 18 to men who were in their 80s-90s. This was one of the most significant
testaments to the fact that India’s democracy was in turmoil at that time.

After 18 months, Emergency which was imposed on 25th June, 1975, was suddenly
revoked in January 1977 with the announcement of general elections to the lower
4
SHVETA UPPAL, POLITICS IN INDIA SINCE INDEPENDENCE 113 (Ncert, 1st ed. 2014).
5
SHVETA UPPAL, POLITICS IN INDIA SINCE INDEPENDENCE 113 (Ncert, 1st ed. 2014).
6
SHVETA UPPAL, POLITICS IN INDIA SINCE INDEPENDENCE 113-114 (Ncert, 1st ed. 2014).
7
SHVETA UPPAL, POLITICS IN INDIA SINCE INDEPENDENCE 112-113 (Ncert, 1st ed. 2014).
 house of the Parliament in the month of March. This decision of Indira Gandhi was as
shocking as the issuance of emergency itself.

The election of 1977

Before the elections of 1977, the last lok sabha elections had taken place in 1971. Now what
led to the next election taking place after 6 years? The reason behind this is the 42 nd
Constitutional Amendment Act, introduced in 1976, this act along with introducing and
amending already existing provisions, introduced an amendment increasing the validity
period of one election from five to six years. 8 Ideally, the election should have taken place in
the year 1978 because in the time of emergencies, there is a provision that election can be
postponed by a year.

However, on 18th January, 1977, Indira Gandhi called for general elections to be held in the
month of March. This decision delighted the country altogether, prisoners were released from
jail including the political leaders. The difference of just 2 months between the declaration
and the actual conduct of election, left the opposition with very less time to prepare
themselves for the upcoming elections, inspite of this the results were in their favour which
was an inevitable event. The election of 1977 apparently acted as a Plebiscite with people
showing either their dissent or their approval to Emergency and Indira Gandhi’s authoritarian
rule.9

The opposition got together to fight against Indira Gandhi with the sole objective of ending
the non-democratic order and restoring the true principles of democracy. Janata Party was
formed by the amalgamation of Bharatiya jana Sangh, the socialists, Bharatiya Lok Dal, and
Congree (o), these parties came together to form Janata Party, which gave India its first non-
congress government. Janata party was formed under the leadership and guidance of
Jayaprakash Narayan, who was the hero of indian struggle immediately before and during
emergency.

8
INDIA CONST. art 83, cl. 2.
9
SHVETA UPPAL, POLITICS IN INDIA SINCE INDEPENDENCE 118 (Ncert, 1st ed. 2014).
The entire propaganda of Janata party during election campaign was to bring into light all the
atrocities committed by the Gandhi government during emergency. And without any surprise
it won the elections. 1977 elections gave a very clear message that the public would not spare
any force that decides to snatch democracy away from the political system of the country.

“The Congress could win only 154 seats in the Lok Sabha. Its share of popular votes fell to
less than 35 per cent. The Janata Party and its allies won 330 out of the 542 seats in the Lok
Sabha; Janata Party itself won 295 seats and thus enjoyed a clear majority. In north India, it
was a massive electoral wave against the Congress. The Congress lost in every constituency
in Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Delhi, Haryana and the Punjab and could win only one seat each in
Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh. Indira Gandhi was defeated from Rae Bareli, as was her son
Sanjay Gandhi from Amethi.”10

Janata party did come into power, however the party was very far from stability, there was a
contention over prime ministership among three major leaders, Morarji Desai who was the
arch enemy of Indira Gandhi from 1966-67 onwards when congress party chose the
leadership of Indira Gandhi over him; Chaudhary Charan Singh, the leader of Bharatiya Lok
Dal who was known to be working in the interest of farmers; and Jagmohan Ram, the founder
of Congress for democracy which was later merged with Janta Party. Ultimately, the decision
of choosing the prime minister was given to Jayaprakash Narayan and it was Morarji Desai
who was selected by him to be the real head of the executive, charan singh became the home
minister though he was not happy with this as he did not want to settle for anything less than
prime ministership. The morarji government basically worked on undoing the damages done

10
SHVETA UPPAL, POLITICS IN INDIA SINCE INDEPENDENCE 118-119 (Ncert, 1st ed. 2014).
by the Indira government to which it succeeded to some extent. Most of the undoings were
done through the 43rd and the 44th Constitutional Amendment Acts, through which the
independence of judiciary was ensured and from the provision of parliamentary supremacy,
we moved back to the principle of checks and balances with proper separation of power.

However, as said before the Janata Government was not stable, various parties that came
together to form the alliance were of different political inclinations and ideologies, they had
come under the same umbrella with just one sole motive that being defeating Imdira Gandhi.
Other than this they just had few things in common, additionally, the hunger for power
further deteriorated the strength of the party. JP who was the unifying force of the party, due
to his ill health decided to withdraw from active politics, this further weakened the party.

As a result of all this the morarji desai government could not last long in power. The Janata
Party got divided, Bharatiya Lok dal that was led by Charan Singh withdrew its support and
soon the socialists who were not happy with Desai’s rule withdrew their support too and
within 18 months of its rule, the desai govt lost its majority and fell. In the month of July
1979, Morarji Desai had to resign.11

The then President Neelama Sanjeev Reddy appointed Charan singh as the prime minister
and called him to prove his majority. The supporters of Jagjeevan Ram abstained from
supporting him, other aides of the janata Party also withdrew, resulting in full-fledged
disintegration of the party.

Indira led congress, which inspite of losing elections of 1977 had managed to secure 154,
promised to support his govt from outside. He was sworn in as the prime minister, but just
before floor test was to be conducted the Indira led congress withdrew its support leading to
the fall of Charan government within 3 weeks. He advised the President to dissolve Lok
Sabha and hold fresh elections. Fresh elections were then conducted in January 1980, in
which Indira Gandhi emerged victorious, she literally swept the poll by securing 353 seats.
And thus Charan Singh’s small four months’ tenure came to an end.

Other than the factors of loose structure of the Janata government with no ideological unity
and contestation over power, some of the other reasons behind its failure are as follows-

 “The decline in the popularity of the Janata government was aided by the stalled
prosecution of Emergency-era abuses. The government had failed to prove most of
11
  Kuldip Singh, OBITUARY: Morarji Desai, The Independent, April 11, 1995.
 the allegations and obtained few convictions. Cases against Indira Gandhi had also
stalled for lack of evidence, and her continued prosecution began to evoke sympathy
for her from the Indian public and anger of her supporters, who saw it as a witch
hunt.”12
 Through 1979, support for Morarji Desai had declined considerably due to worsening
economic conditions as well as the emergence of allegations of nepotism and
corruption involving members of his family. Desai's confrontational attitude eroded
his support.13
 The janata government did not have any concrete policy towards addressing problems
other than that of emergency, economic stability wasn’t achieved. At the same time
the party lacked any kid of strong leadership and did not even have any concrete plan
on governance of a nation that had just come out of national emergency.

12
Kuldip Singh, OBITUARY: Morarji Desai, The Independent, April 11, 1995.
13
Kuldip Singh, OBITUARY: Morarji Desai, The Independent, April 11, 1995.
Restoration of democratic set up by the Janata Government

The janata government had come to power because of the blatant misconduct of the Indira
regime during emergency, the entire democratic set was disbalanced and through this
election’s verdict, the public showed its dissent over what happened in the country over the
past 18 months.

After having come to power, it had become Janata government’s responsibility to do justice
to the people who had put it there in the first place.

 Its objective was to undo all the constitutional haphazard committed by the Indira
Government during emergency that led to disbalance in the powers allocated to
different organs of the government, compromised with the independece of judiciary
and led the political system of India towards parliamentary supremacy.
The janata government passed the 43rd and the 44th constitutional amendment acts to
restore the previous constitutional provisions and add some provisions to prevent as
uneventful event like Emergency of 1975 from repeating itself.
I. The 43rd CAA restored constitutional provisions regarding the jurisdiction of
Supreme court and the High Courts that were amended under 42 nd CAA. Some
of these amended provisions were namely that the Supreme court did not have
the jurisdiction to check the constitutional validity of State laws. To stop the
misuse of preventive detention article 31D, which gave the parliament
immense power of taking recourse to any way like massively abusing the
detainee for stopping apprehended anti-national actiuvities, was also omitted.14
II. Article 352 was amended under 44th CAA to replace the term “internal
disturbance’ with “armed rebellion” to prevent the episode of 1975 from
repeating itself.15 It was further stated that the president of India cant issue the
proclamation of emergency solely on the discretion og the PM as happened in
1975, but he would require the written submission of the decision og the
council of ministers for doing that.

14
Prof. Narender Kumar, Constitutional Law of India 1047 ( Allahabad Law Agency, 8th ed. 2011).
15
Prof. Narender Kumar, Constitutional Law of India 1048 ( Allahabad Law Agency, 8th ed. 2011).
 III. Article 358 and 359 were amended to safeguard fundamental rights even
during emergency. Now articles 20 and 21 of Part III can’t be suspended even
during emergency.16
IV. Article 22 was also amended by the 44 th CAA so far as safeguards against
preventive detention were concerned.
The morarji government however failed to address the amendments brought to
article 368, namely adding two clauses with one giving unrestrictive power to
the parliament to amend any constitutional provision and the seconf clause
maintained that Supreme court will not have any power to review them.
Article 31 C which was introduced through 25 th CAA was also amended
establishing the supremacy of DPSPs over FRs.
This amendment to the constitution was declared unconstitutionl by Minerva
mills case of 1980, this case provided for the supremacy of FRs over DPSPs
and the court maintained that the provision of judicial review is a part of the
basic structure of the constitution and cant be taken away. 17 It established that
the power of the parliament to amend the constitution is limited depending
upon the doctrine of Basic structure.

 The second objective or to say the first objective of the government was to look into
the period of emergency in detail and study the extent to which constitutional powers
were misused by the Indira regime. In order to fulfil the same, in the year 1977, it set
up an inquiry commission headed by the former Chief Justice of India, Justice J.C.
Shah to inquire into the excesses committed by the Indira Gandhi government from
1975 to 1977.
“The commission published its report on the illegal events during the emergency and
the persons responsible in three volumes totaling 525 pages. The first interim report
was submitted on 11 March 1978, 149 dealing with the lead-up to the declaration of
the Emergency and the way in which the press was prevented from speaking out. The
second interim report discussed police actions and the role of Sanjay Gandhi at the
Turkman Gate incident in which police fired on a crowd of people protesting against

16
Prof. Narender Kumar, Constitutional Law of India 1048 ( Allahabad Law Agency, 8th ed. 2011).
17
Minerva Mills Ltd. vs Union Of India, AIR 1980 SC 1789.
 demolition of their houses. The final report was issued on 6 August 1978 and covered
prison conditions, torture and family planning atrocities.”
The commission found that the decision to impose Emergency was solely of Indira
Gandhi and no minister was consulted, it also found out the there was no economic
crisis and problem of law and order that couldn’t have been dealt with without the
imposition of Emergency.
Shah Commission in its reports mentioned the following atrocities that had taken
place during emergency-
1. Thousands of people were arrested during emergency and were not even told
about their crime
2. “The provisions of MISA and DRA were misused to afflict abuse and torture
on the detainees”
3. Under Sanjay Gandhi’s Family programme, many men were forcefully
sterilised.
4. Media was put under press censorship so that no information against the govt
could be printed, additionally, the state owned media was being misused to
spread false information.
5. Slums around the area of Delhi were demolished in the name of beautification
of the capital on Sanjay Gandhi’s order.

 During its election campaign, the Janata Party promised to redeem the press rights as
soon as it came to power. Upon forming the Government at the parliamentary level,
the Janata government did not hesitate from fulfilling its said objective and through a
series of steps, redeemed the press rights.
Conclusion

It may be observed that albeit, the Janata Party was structurally very weak, did not have
leadership and lacked concrete agendas other than eradication the aftermath of emergency
consequently failing to complete full five-year tenure of a central government, it played a
very important role in the restoration of democratic principles which were under turmoil
during the Indira imposed national Emergency.

It may be very well to point out the historic nature of this 6 th Lok Sabha Election. Every
harm inflicted upon the democracy of India and the constitution was undone by the
government that won this historic election.

It is also important in a way that this election established first non-congress regime at the
centre, thus demolishing Congress’ thirty year long monopoly at central level.

This election apart from teaching the lesson that those who misuse the constitutional
provisions and try to harm the democratic political system of the nation are punished by
the public, also sent out another important lesson. This second lesson was that those
regimes which are structurally unstable and non-unified are also not accepted by the
public. The testament of this lesson was seen in the election of 1980, where Indira Gandhi
swept the poll despite the fact that she was the only leader who was severely thrashed by
the public not more than three years ago or who had become a subject of detest due to
imposition of Emergency. The sole reason behinf this was the inherent instability of the
Janata Party which soon led to formation of factions and ultimately its disintegration.

To conclude, I would say that the Janata Government in its short tenure succeeded in
restoring democracy of India back to its original place, rather it strengthened it more by
introducing some new provisions to help prevent the episode of 1975 from repeating
itself. India post 1977 elections, came out stronger, more powerful and democratic than it
was ever before.