The Dream of a Revolution by Bimal Prasad & SUJATA PRASAD

The Dream of a Revolution by Bimal Prasad & SUJATA PRASAD

Author:Bimal Prasad & SUJATA PRASAD [PRASAD, BIMAL & PRASAD, SUJATA]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9789390914067
Publisher: Penguin Random House India Private Limited
Published: 2021-08-02T00:00:00+00:00


8

The Sting in the Tail

The months leading up to, and after, the elections of 1967 were enveloped in a fog of chaos, intrigue, and violence. Addressing a turbulent election meeting in Bhubaneswar in early February, Indira Gandhi was struck in the face by stones, hurled by young men who were shouting and jeering at her. Growing up in a small sub-Himalayan town, Ramachandra Guha recalls a slogan that was very popular at the time: ‘Jana Sangh ko vote do bidi peena chhorh do, bidi mein tambaku hai, kangresswala daku hai.’ 1 My own memory, charged with emotion, is of prancing around two very elegant men in starched white khadi kurtas discussing the run of watershed events, convinced that the turbulent economic and political headwinds that were sweeping through the country would blow Nehru’s petite daughter away: my father and Jayaprakash at our tiny home at the rear end of Sapru House, Delhi.

The Congress, clinging to its worn-out shibboleths, was battered by the rise of non-Congress populist coalitions which, far from being stable, faced internal dissension and floor-crossing by legislators in search of power and money. Indira contested from Raebareli, Feroze Gandhi’s constituency, reaching out to people as a traditional ‘bahu’. The strategy worked and she won with a huge margin. The party’s seat tally, however, went down to 283. The Congress was also voted out in several state elections, collapsing in UP, Bihar, Kerala, Punjab, Orissa, West Bengal, Rajasthan and Tamil Nadu. The sceptics watched, as Indira was sworn in as prime minister on 13 March 1967.

As the country lurched from one economic crisis to another, Indira found herself in a thicket of thorny issues. The quiet crisis of the economy in the 1950s and early 1960s was assuming epic proportions. Agricultural production, more or less wholly flat since 1960, was affected by a succession of severe droughts in most parts of the country. The population was growing by 2.5 per cent at over 13 million a year. The per capita income was less than $80 a year. Unemployment had quadrupled. There was near stagnation in industrial production, which hovered around 3.3 per cent during 1965–70, and a massive trade deficit. There was an exponential increase in inflation—prices continued to rise, by as much as 22 per cent in 1972–73. There were food shortages, rice riots and masses of desperately poor Indians. 2

Indira sized up the situation and immediately took control. By May 1967, she was ready with a radical, socialist, left-of-centre programme of reforms that included plans to discontinue princely privileges by abolishing privy purses; guarantee of minimal wages for rural and industrial labour; nationalization of the insurance sector; social control of banking institutions; state trading in foodgrains and removal of monopolies. These plans found ideological resonance with the socialist group within the party led by Young Turks like Mohan Dharia and Chandra Shekhar.

By 1969, Indira was ready to defy the ‘Syndicate’, a caucus of Congress bosses who had sidelined Morarji Desai in their move to install her as prime minister.



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