Tharoor criticizes Emergency, Gandhis in article | Thiruvananthapuram News
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Tharoor criticizes Emergency, Gandhis in article
Congress Working Committee member wrote an article sharply criticising the Emergency and the Gandhis for it. Tharoor states in the article that today’s India is democratic and has gained more confidence and progress. “Let us not merely remember the Emergency as a dark chapter in India’s history, but instead internalise its lessons,” he writes. The article was published on an English website and in a vernacular daily in Kerala. It could be perceived as an open provocation of the Congress brass to take disciplinary action.
wrote an article sharply criticising the Emergency and the Gandhis for it.
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In the article, published on an English website and in a vernacular daily in Kerala, Tharoor strongly criticised former PM
and her son Sanjay Gandhi. “Indira Gandhi’s harshness led public life into fear. Indira insisted that only an Emergency could bring discipline to the country. The outside world was unaware of the torture in detention and the murders without trial,” he wrote.
He said Sanjay’s actions were extremely brutal.
The govt at the time facilitated these actions. After the Emergency, people expressed their anger by ousting Indira and her party in the elections in 1977. Tharoor states in the article that today’s India is democratic and has gained more confidence and progress.
For 21 long months, fundamental rights were suspended; the press was muzzled; and political dissent was brutally suppressed. The world’s largest democracy held its breath, as the very essence of its constitutional promise — liberty, equality, fraternity — was severely tested, he said.
The judiciary buckled under immense pressure to back the move, with the Supreme Court even upholding the suspension of habeas corpus and citizens’ fundamental right to liberty. Journalists, activists and opposition leaders found themselves behind bars, Tharoor pointed out in the article.
“In the quest for ‘discipline’ and ‘order’, often translated into unspeakable cruelty, exemplified by the forced vasectomy campaigns led by Sanjay and concentrated in poorer and rural areas, where coercion and violence were used to meet arbitrary targets,” he wrote.
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Tharoor concludes the article by saying, “Let us not merely remember the Emergency as a dark chapter in India’s history, but instead internalise its lessons. Let it be a constant reminder to people everywhere that democracy cannot be taken for granted; it is a precious inheritance that must be constantly nurtured and fiercely defended.”