India’s Authoritarian Turn: Understanding the Emergency (1975–1977) and Its Afterlife

On June 25, 1975, Prime Minister (PM) Indira Gandhi imposed a national emergency (the Emergency) in India, suspending civil and political rights. Lasting for 21 months, the Emergency was the only dictatorial turn in India’s democratic history. The authoritarian rule was in response to an assertive citizens’ protest against Prime Minister Gandhi, which demanded her resignation on the grounds of the centralization of power, corruption, rising prices, and in the name of fair wages for workers and unemployment. The higher courts had also debarred her from contesting elections. Since then, the dominant accounts of this period have tried to ascertain answers to three questions: Why was the Emergency imposed? What did the Emergency entail? And finally, why was it lifted? The books in this review essay together comprise a tour de force on these three aspects, while also seeking to go beyond these questions. Christophe Jaffrelot and Pratinav Anil’s India’s First Dictatorship: The Emergency, 1975–77 shows how the Emergency has cast a long shadow and is also a window into understanding some of the present trends in Indian politics. Gyan Prakash’s Emergency Chronicles: Indira Gandhi and Democracy’s Turning Point claims that the Emergency had both a “before” and “afterlife”; the origins of excessive state power are inherent in the Constitution. Parsa Venkateshwar Rao Jr.’s The Emergency: An Unpopular History provides a revisionist account of the Emergency through the lenses of parliamentary discussions. While engaging with these important books, this review essay suggests an alternate “afterlife” of the Emergency that is untreated in the works discussed here.

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印度的威权主义转向：理解“印度紧急状态”（1975-1977）及其身后影响

关键词：印度，全国紧急状态，英迪拉∙甘地，民主

1975年6月25日，印度总理英迪拉∙甘地实行了全国紧急状态（ “印度紧急状态” ），限制公民权利和政治权利。“印度紧急状态”持续了21个月，是印度民主历史上第一个独裁转向。这套威权主义控制是对一场坚定地反对甘地总理的公民抗议的回应——因为权力集中化、腐败及物价飞涨，以及工人和失业者的不公正薪酬，抗议活动要求她引咎辞职。高等法院也已经禁止她挑战选举结果。从那时起，对该段时期的主流说法就力图澄清三个问题：为何会实行紧急状态？紧急状态的实行涉及到哪些方面？最终，为什么会解除紧急状态？ 本文所点评的几部著作一起构成了解答这三个问题的杰作， 并且寻求超越这些问题。克里斯托夫·贾弗雷洛和普雷提纳夫·阿尼尔的《印度的第一次独裁统治：1975-77年的“紧急状态”》展示了“紧急状态”是怎样投下了长久的阴影，同时也是理解印度政治中一些现有趋势的一个窗口。吉安∙普拉卡什的《紧急状态编年史：英迪拉∙甘地与民主的转折点》宣称“紧急状态”既有“前生”也有“后世”；过度的国家权力的源起就内在于宪法之中。小帕尔萨∙ 维卡特斯∙劳的《“紧急状态”：非流行的历史》通过国会讨论的视角为”紧急状态”提供了修正主义的解说。在对这些重要著作的评述的同时，本文提出“紧急状态”的“身后影响”的一个替代版本，这些著作均未能对其进行论述。

Translated from English by Li Guo